Friendship Has Its Limits
by Gemzgurl
Summary: Sequel to Love and Hate. At the end of sixth year, Lily and James become friends. It turns out that this friendship is all that keeps the two sane as dark times pass over Hogwarts in their seventh year. But even friendship has its limits...
1. Head Boy

Friendship Has Its Limits  
  
Summary: Sequel to Love and Hate. Lily Evans and James Potter finally became friends in their sixth year of Hogwarts. Now it's their seventh and final year at Hogwarts, and in the dark times that befall the five friends, friendship is important. But even friendship has limits...  
  
Lily Evans lay in her bed, cursing the sun. She was wearing an emerald green camisole (A/N: Which is a sleeveless shirt) and a pair of rather short shorts, and had her fan on high, but it still felt as if it were boiling point or close to it in her upstairs bedroom. This was why she liked spring and autumn better than winter and summer. Spring and autumn rarely ever had such extreme temperatures, which was more than she could say for the other two seasons.  
  
"This weather is simply ridiculous," she complained loudly as she trudged down the stairs and into the kitchen.  
  
She walked over to the cabinet where her family kept the glasses and poured herself a cup of water. She found herself tempted to pour the glass over her head. Suddenly someone was lifting up her fiery red hair and running an ice cube all over her neck.  
  
Lily whipped around to see the ugliest man that she had ever laid her sparkling green eyes on. He was a large man with an ugly, purple face. His fingers were like ten sausages attached to two fat arms. A vein stuck out and throbbed in his temple. He seemed to have no neck at all.  
  
"Who are you?" she demanded.  
  
"My name is Vernon Dursley," the man said. His voice was deep, much more deeper than any of the boys that Lily knew, which meant that he was probably older than any of the boys she knew, apart from her dad. He leered at her. "And you must be---"  
  
"Lily! You aren't bothering my sweetums Vernon, are you?" Petunia came rushing into the kitchen at the sounds of her freaky little sister actually speaking to Vernon. Petunia smiled up at Vernon.  
  
"Well, actually, Vernon here was taking the liberty of cooling me down," Lily amended her sister in a syrupy-sweet voice. "With an ice cube, on the back of my neck." She smiled innocently at her older sister.  
  
Petunia's smile faded almost immediately, much to Lily's own happiness. Lately Lily had gotten into the habit of trying to ruin all of Petunia's fun, since Petunia had bestowed the same "kindness" onto her.  
  
"Oh?" Petunia said, voice sounding high-pitched. She stared hard at Vernon Dursley, who tried his best to look innocent.  
  
"It was a simple mistake," he said, and found both Evans girls staring at him. "I could have sworn that it was my dear Petunia that was standing by the sink. I'm sure that anyone could have made that mistake."  
  
Lily raised an eyebrow. She glanced at her sister, who probably couldn't get much different than Lily. Lily had thick red hair that fell to her shoulders, dazzling emerald green, almond-shaped eyes, and her skin was ashen, as if she did her best to stay away from the sun. Petunia had thin brown hair that hung loosely around her bony face, pale eyes, and her skin was a golden tan. And while Lily had a normal length of neck, Petunia could have probably given a giraffe a run for its money.  
  
"Oh, yes," Lily mocked, nodding her head. "I'm sure anyone could have made that mistake, you know, because Petty and I are so much alike in looks and behavior." She plastered on a false smile. "Well, I have to go and buy my school supplies now, so I'll see you later."  
  
"Hey, Lily?" Petunia called after her sister. Lily stopped in the doorway to the kitchen and looked back. "Did Vernon tell you the good news?" When Lily looked confused, her sister elaborated, "We're getting married!"  
  
"I can't believe it," Lily said, shaking her head. "I thought even Petunia would have a better sense than to marry someone like him!"  
  
"He's not that bad, is he?" Alexa asked. She, Sirius, Lily, James, Remus and Peter were all in the Leaky Cauldron, sitting at one table and discussing each of their summers.  
  
Lily remembered the ice cube on her neck and shivered, saying, "He's that bad."  
  
Just then, six owls landed on their table and dispensed a letter to each one of the seventeen year olds. Lily eagerly opened her letter, knowing that it was from Hogwarts. She could hardly wait, as this would be the year that new Head Boy and Girl would be chosen. As she opened her letter something fell out of the parchment and clattered onto the table. Lily, trying to hide her joy and failing, picked up the silver badge with shaking fingers.  
  
"I'm Head Girl!" she squealed, causing several of the inhabitants of the pub to turn and look at her. "I can't believe this! I'm Head Girl!"  
  
Without realizing what she had done, Lily had thrown her arms round James's neck (because he was sitting right beside her) in her fit of joy. Sirius clapped his hand over his mouth and tried to quiet his snickers as James grinned smugly and wrapped his arms round her waist.  
  
Lily pulled back immediately, blushing crimson. Quickly she turned to Remus, trying to cover up her embarrassment. "Well, where's your badge? Surely you're Head Boy."  
  
"I haven't got a badge," Remus stated, turning his letter upside-down to prove the fact. "I'm not Head Boy, someone else is."  
  
"Well, I for one, hope that it is not Lucius Malfoy who's gotten Head Boy," Lily said flatly. "I don't think I could hand having to work with him all year as Head Girl---"  
  
"Really, Lils, did you think that you wouldn't get chosen for Head Girl?" Sirius asked, raising his eyebrows. "You didn't even have any competition."  
  
"Well, there was that one girl from Ravenclaw, Therese Lemmings---"  
  
"It was always you, and you know it. Everyone else knew that you were going to get it, and even you weren't really surprised by getting it, although you were pretty ecstatic. James, don't you agree? Evans was bound to get it."  
  
Everyone turned to look at James, who had suddenly gotten very quiet.  
  
"Oi, Prongs, what have you got there that's so interesting?" asked Sirius, trying to peep over James's shoulder to see what James had clamped in his fist.  
  
A sudden thought came into Lily's mind. Her eyes grew as wide as golf balls. "No..." she breathed. "You can't be...I mean, surely you aren't..."  
  
James looked up into her green eyes. She swallowed, knowing what he was going to say. He nodded at her, and her hand flew up to her chest, right over her heart which was beating so fast it was getting hard to breathe.  
  
"I'm Head Boy." 


	2. Impossible

Friendship Has Its Limits  
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, apart from Alexa and anyone else you might not recognize. The characters that you do recognize from the Harry Potter books all belong to the brilliant imagination of J. K. Rowling. Okay, I'm done now.  
  
Alexa burst into laughter. "You've got to be joking," she said, looking around at everyone. "Right? No one in their right mind would make James Potter Head Boy with Lily Evans as Head Girl."  
  
"No one in their right mind would ever make Prongs Head Boy, with Lils as Head Girl or not," Sirius said. "James has got to be joking."  
  
Remus looked skeptical as he said, rather sarcastically, "I don't think he's joking, you guys. He looks pretty sincere with that silver badge that says Head Boy on it in his hands."  
  
When everyone looked to James's hands, they were all thoroughly shocked to see that indeed, he held a shiny badge with the words Head Boy on it. Lily had become extremely pale in the last few moments, and now she sunk into a nearby chair, where she then began fanning herself with her hand.  
  
"Dumbledore's gone mad," Alexa swore. "That's the only logical explanation for all of this mess. Doesn't he realize the chaos that will ensue his crowning James one of the Heads of the school?"  
  
"Like what?" squeaked Peter.  
  
"Firstly, Malfoy will be dragging his mother dearest into all of this mess," Alexa said scornfully. "And we all know that Beatrice Malfoy is NOT the most darling woman in the world. Remember what happened when James hexed Malfoy bright pink, and Mrs. Malfoy came to the school and---"  
  
Remus, Sirius and Peter all listened while Alexa recited exactly what had happened three years ago, when Beatrice Malfoy had come to Hogwarts. That had not been one of the happiest times of Hogwarts history, as far as everyone but Lucius Malfoy was concerned. It was quite obvious after that of where Malfoy got his horrible temper.  
  
James went over to the chair where Lily was sitting, staring unblinkingly at the wall in front of her and still waving her hand in front of her face. He stood there awkwardly for a moment before sitting on his knees to get a better look at her.  
  
"Lily? Do you think that maybe you might be okay with this whole I'm- Head-Boy thing?" he asked cautiously.  
  
"I'm not sure," she answered and turned her head to face him, fixing him with her green eyes. "But there isn't anything that either of us can do about it, now is there? And besides, last year, I became your friend, and friends should be happy for each other when they get something like this. It is a high title, after all, and I think that I'd be---"she coughed a few times----"honored to work with you."  
  
"Really?" he asked incredulously. "Wait, why would you, Lily Adrianna Evans be honored to work with me, James Isaac Potter?" He eyed her suspiciously.  
  
"I didn't know your middle name was Isaac," Lily commented absently.  
  
"Don't change the subject," he said sternly. "Answer me."  
  
"Because," she said, slightly exasperated, "I am trying to be a good friend. Is there something wrong with that? Besides, I think that maybe, just maybe, you might make a good Head Boy, okay? Are you happy now?"  
  
"Very, sweetie," he answered smugly.  
  
"Call me sweetie again, and I swear I'll rip out your vocal cords."  
  
"Right. Sorry."  
  
"Mum!" James shouted when he got home from Diagon Alley. "Mum! MUM!"  
  
"For heaven's sake, James Potter what is it?" asked an alarmed Mrs. Potter, thinking there was something wrong. "Calm down. Now what is it?" She wiped her hands on her apron, turning to face her only son.  
  
"I'm Head Boy this year at Hogwarts!" cried James happily. "And you know Lily Evans, right? Well, she's Head Girl! Isn't that great? Aren't you proud of me?"  
  
"Head Boy?" repeated Mrs. Potter incredulously. "You've got to be kidding. There's no way that you, James Isaac Potter, can be Head Boy. It's- --it's practically physically impossible. I thought you said that Remus was surely going to get it?"  
  
"Way to be supportive, Mum," James grumbled irritably. Why did everyone think that it wasn't possible for him to be Head Boy? It wasn't that impossible, surely, or else he wouldn't have the Head Boy badge in the back pocket of his jeans. "Thanks a lot."  
  
"Well can you blame me?" his mother responded. "After all the letters I've gotten since your first year at Hogwarts, most of them being about detentions or how you turned some innocent girl's hair bright pink, or how-- -"  
  
"I get the point, Mum," grumbled James. "Most of those girls weren't innocent. And if it's so impossible for me to be Head Boy how come my Hogwarts letter says that I'm the new Head Boy and that I'll find my badge enclosed in the letter? I have the badge to prove it and everything!"  
  
He reached into the back pocket of his jeans and produced the shiny badge, handing it to his mother to examine. Mrs. Potter took the badge and put her hand over her heart when she realized that it was real.  
  
Poor Mum, James thought, watching his mum stare at his new badge, she's probably having a heart attack, like Lily. After all, Lily reacted the same way when I said that I was Head Boy.  
  
Mrs. Potter finally regained her composure and smiled faintly at her son. "I can't believe that you're really Head Boy, I'm not sure how you managed to pull it off, but---"  
  
"James is Head Boy?" said Mr. Potter from the doorway. "Is it any wonder how he pulled it off? He is my son after all."  
  
"That's what makes me wonder how he got Head Boy," Mrs. Potter muttered, rolling her eyes. "Now what's all that racket outside---?" A sudden banging on the Potters' front door made Mrs. Potter jump.  
  
"I'll get it," said James, and raced to stop the battering of the door. He wrenched the door open and was nearly knocked flat on his back when Sirius came barging in the living room, hauling his trunk in behind him.  
  
"I'VE HAD IT!" he roared, tossing his trunk on the carpet. "I'VE BLOODY HAD IT WITH THAT SO CALLED FAMILY OF MINE, I SWEAR I HAVE! THEY'VE GONE TOO FAR THIS TIME!"  
  
"Padfoot mate, what are you going---?"  
  
"Sirius! My goodness, what happened?" Mrs. Potter immediately rushed into the living room when she heard Sirius's voice, Mr. Potter quickly in tow. "What has that wretched family of yours done this time?"  
  
Sirius was fuming as he snarled, "They've really done it this time! They've threatened to disown me, ME, LIKE I DID SOMETHING WRONG! And all because I started dating Alexa, who's mum is a witch and her dad's a Muggle- --"  
  
"Wait, you've been dating Alexa?" broke in James.  
  
"Only since the end of the year," Sirius said irritably. "Anyway, my family wanted to disown me because I'm not dating someone of pureblood, someone who 'good enough' for them! So I told my mother not to bother disowning me, because I'd had it with that horrible place, and now I'm here."  
  
"Oh, you poor dear," exclaimed Mrs. Potter, shaking her head in disgust. "There's only one thing that you can do, Sirius."  
  
"What's that?" Mr. Potter, James and Sirius all asked together.  
  
"You'll have to stay with us. You're welcome for as long as you like." 


	3. An Accident That Wasn't Quite Accidental

Friendship Has Its Limits  
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, apart from Alexa and anyone else you might not recognize. The characters that you do recognize from the Harry Potter books all belong to the brilliant imagination of J. K. Rowling. Okay, I'm done now.  
  
"Lily!" Lily's father's voice wafted upstairs and floated into her room. "Lily, you're friend is on the phone!"  
  
Friend? she thought. Which friend? None of her friends knew how to work the telephone as far as she knew. It couldn't be a Muggle; Lily didn't have Muggle friends. Shrugging her shoulders, she went downstairs and in to the living room, where her father was standing, holding the telephone in his hands.  
  
Tall and handsome, Mr. Evans had red hair, the same shade as Lily's and brown eyes. He was in his late thirties, but tried not to show it. He looked older than he actually was, but Lily knew that was because all the stress of her mother's death had caused him. She felt a pang of loneliness only thinking of her mum.  
  
"Thanks, Daddy," she said, probably sounding as if she were three years old again. "Hello?" she said into the phone when her dad had handed it to her.  
  
"Hello, Lily," a woman's voice said through the phone. "I know you don't know who I am, but I know that you'll be wanting to know who I am soon enough. My name is Dr. LehAnn. I was your mother's close friend, and her gynecologist."  
  
Lily's jaw dropped open. She looked to her dad, who just smiled and walked out of the room, oblivious to the way Lily was behaving. He just passed it off as something that her "friend" said. For several moments, Lily couldn't speak. She just stood there, holding the phone to her ear with her mouth open. She took the phone away from her ear and looked at it as if it were going to bite her.  
  
"W-why are you calling me?" she managed to ask finally.  
  
"Because I know that you're in Hogwarts by now," answered Dr. LehAnn. Lily was totally taken aback by this statement. "And I have something to show you, that you really should be seeing now about your mum. Can you meet me at my clinic in say, an hour?"  
  
An hour later, Lily was sitting in a grey chair in a small, cold building, waiting to be seen by Dr. LehAnn. She'd managed to borrow her dad's car (she'd gotten her driver's license over Christmas break when she was sixteen) without him asking too many questions about where she was going and why. She figured that if this woman, her mum's child doctor and close friend, had something to show her, something that she ought to know about her mum, then she'd better go.  
  
A short woman with thick brown and slightly greying hair came out into the waiting room, looked around for a moment, spotted Lily and headed over to her. "Ah, Lily. I'm Dr. LehAnn." She held out her hand for Lily to shake, and Lily took it. "Come on back here with me, to Exam Room 2 so I can show you something."  
  
Lily followed Dr. LehAnn down one hallway, left down another and finally to a door that said in gold letters, "Exam Room 2" on it. The woman opened the door, let Lily inside, and then closed the door after her. The room was not very large, with two beds on either side of the room with pale blue curtains hanging from the ceiling around them. There was a microscope on a counter, which Dr. LehAnn fussed with for a moment before beckoning Lily over to her.  
  
"Lily, these are red blood cells from your mum's system," the doctor explained, motioning for Lily to look through the microscope. Lily did so, squinting to properly see the red cells.  
  
What she saw made her stomach flip over. She knew this was going to be bad. "They aren't supposed to look like this, are they?" she asked, swallowing. She couldn't explain exactly what was wrong with the cells, but she knew that they weren't supposed to look like they did. "They're all...deformed."  
  
"I'm afraid that they aren't supposed to look like that, no." Dr. LehAnn looked grim when Lily looked back at her. "Your mother wasn't killed trying to give birth to Harry, Lily. She had a magical induced cancer, which spread through her veins, deforming her red blood cells and, incidentally spreading to the unborn child."  
  
"What---How do you know about magic?"  
  
"I'm a Squib, dear."  
  
Lily swallowed again. Her brain scrambled to understand what this all meant. "So what you're saying is that my mum's death wasn't due to complications in birth?"  
  
"That's exactly what I'm saying. I'm saying that your mum's death wasn't accidental. Adrienne Evans was murdered."  
  
James knew when he took one look at Lily that something was wrong. He, Sirius, Remus, Alexa and Lily were all in the Potters' backyard, discussing Sirius's moving into James's house with his family. James noticed that Lily seemed disconnected somehow, like she wasn't even aware of what was happening around her. She was pale, and her green eyes had that same lifelessness in them as they had when he'd mentioned her mum a couple of weeks ago.  
  
"And anyway, my dear old mother of mine says---"Sirius was saying to Remus and Alexa, who were both listening intently to him. James wasn't listening, but it didn't matter; Sirius had already told him this story several times now. He went over and sat beside Lily, without her even noticing the move.  
  
"What's wrong?" he asked. She turned her head so fast that James could barely see her move it at all, seeming to snap out of her trance.  
  
"Nothing," she answered quickly. "It's just that---never mind. It's- it's really nothing. Someone called me earlier today, and it was just kind of intense." She tried to change the subject. "So what's going on with Sirius moving in with you?"  
  
But James wasn't fooled. "His mum disowned him after he started dating Alexa," he said impatiently. "Who called you?" He knew little about the telephone, but he knew that it was some form of Muggle communication. "What did they call you about?"  
  
"It was a woman," said Lily uncomfortably. "A doctor, actually. She called about---about my mum. Can we leave it at that? Please?" Lily's tone was pleading.  
  
"What did she want with you then?" James pressed, knowing that he was treading on dangerous ground. Lily already looked upset, and keeping on about the subject of her mum was not helping to make her happier. "Surely she knows that---"  
  
"James, just drop it already!" Lily cried, causing the others to look at them both. "Please, let's just stop talking about it. I don't want to talk about it anymore. Please, James, just let it go."  
  
"Lily, I---"He stopped, searching for words. He didn't dare take this conversation much further than he already had. A part of his brain was telling him just to let it go. But the other part, the larger part, was saying that Lily would probably feel better if she spoke about it. "Lily, if you just tell me, I'll leave you alone, I---"  
  
"We've been through this before, James! Why can't you ever just leave something be? Must you constantly pick at something, even though I don't want to discuss it? Haven't you any consideration for my feelings in this matter?"  
  
Tears threatened to spill from her eyes, all because James had dug up the raw feelings of her mother's murder. Lily stood up and ran through the Potters' house, mumbling an apology to Mrs. Potter, who she almost knocked over in her rush to get away from that situation. James instantly regretted pushing Lily so far.  
  
A moment after the four teens heard the front door slam, Mrs. Potter came outside, a puzzled expression on her face. "What on earth made that sweet Lily Evans girl go running out in such a hurry? She looked as if she were on fire!"  
  
"I don't know what was wrong with her," James answered slowly, "but I wouldn't recommend asking her about it either." Mrs. Potter raised an eyebrow, shrugged and went back inside.  
  
"What was wrong with Lily, James?" asked Alexa. "Your mum's right. She sure was in a hurry to get out of here. What did you do this time?"  
  
James shrugged helplessly. "I don't know what was wrong with her, but I intend to find out."  
  
A/N: Oh the drama. Sorry about all the drama that I seemed to stuff in this chapter. I can't believe that I'm actually going to post this chapter. I hate writing about so much drama, but it just seemed to come out. Sorry. 


	4. Lily's List of Problems

Friendship Has Its Limits  
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, apart from Alexa and anyone else you might not recognize. The characters that you do recognize from the Harry Potter books all belong to the brilliant imagination of J. K. Rowling. Okay, I'm done now.  
  
Lily lay in her front yard for a long time, just thinking about her mum. She could picture her perfectly in her mind; after all, she'd known her mum for twelve years when she'd died.  
  
To Lily, Adrienne Evans was the picture of beauty, with her soft, delicate wave of brunette curls down to her waist, and the same emerald green eyes that Lily herself had prized since birth. Mrs. Evans hadn't been particularly tall, standing only at five feet, three inches, but her height didn't really matter. Her complexion was creamy, her skin soft to the touch. The bridge of her nose was dotted with freckles, just like Lily's.  
  
Not only had her mum been beautiful on the outside, but she also held a great deal of inner beauty. She was kind, rarely ever raising her voice at her girls or at her husband. She loved flowers (which explained Lily and Petunia's names). She adored animals, and had insisted that the girls grow up with at least one animal in their lives, so she had bought a parakeet.  
  
The parakeet had died shortly after Mrs. Evans had.  
  
The sound of a car door slamming pulled Lily out of her thoughts. "Hey Lily!" called a cheerful voice from the driveway. Lily turned to see a woman with blonde hair in her early thirties waving at her. Veronica. "You want to help me bring in the groceries?"  
  
"Oh, hi Veronica," Lily said in a less-than-enthusiastic manner. "Sure. I have nothing better to do with my life than to help you put away food." Veronica was her dad's new wife, her step mum. They'd been married for three years now, and Lily could still not manage to make herself like her father's blushing bride.  
  
"Good to hear it," Veronica said, handing a bag full of vegetables to Lily. Veronica wasn't cruel or anything, but Lily still couldn't help not liking her.  
  
Lily took the bag of vegetables in to the house and set them on the table. She hadn't seen her father for a while, and she wondered distantly where he was. She wandered to the bedroom that her father and Veronica now shared. She opened the door and looked around. Her dad was sitting on the floor with a shoebox full of pictures and a bottle of beer beside him.  
  
"Dad?" she said, entering the room and closing the door behind her. "Daddy? What are you---?" Lily's mum's face smiled brightly up at her from the floor. Lily stopped where she was and fell to her knees on the floor in front of her father. He was looking at her mum's pictures.  
  
Lily carefully picked up one of the pictures and looked at it. It was one of Adrienne, Petunia and herself at Christmas time. It was the one taken just before her mum's death. Her stomach was swollen, her skin a bit pale, but she was still smiling never the less. Lily had her head resting on her mother's stomach, trying to feel the baby kick, she remembered. Petunia was on the other side of their mum, with her arm around Mrs. Evans's shoulders, smiling at the camera.  
  
Those had been happy times. Everyone in the household always wore a smile on their faces, getting ready for the baby. No one had even suspected murder, or even a death in the family. They'd been so stupid, Lily thought now. Now that she looked back, she noticed that her mum had been getting sicklier everyday, but everyone just thought it was because of the pregnancy. Even Adrienne had believed it to be the unborn baby causing her to get that sickly.  
  
But it hadn't been baby Harry at all. Someone had wanted Adrienne Evans dead, someone in the magical community. But why did they want her dead? What had her mother done to deserve to be killed?  
  
Memories of a little blue baby lying on a small bed flashed through Lily's brain, followed by her mother's pasty-white corpse, lying on a hospital bed, her beautiful green eyes closed forever, her lips placed in a thin line, never to smile again, her dimples never to be shown again.  
  
No one deserves to die in such a horrible way, Lily thought fiercely. She set the photo back on the ground when she realized that she was holding it so tightly that her knuckles were turning white. She thought back to just a few hours ago, when James wanted to know what was going on with her, and she hadn't told him. Looking back at that moment when she'd gone running out of his house, she felt guilty for not telling James what was wrong. After all, friends told friends everything.  
  
Then again, she'd just learned that everything she believed about her mother's death five years ago had been a lie. After all, she had just learned that her mother's death wasn't accidental, but actually wanted by someone. Someone magical who had access to a wand and a spell to cause magical cancer.  
  
"I've got to...clean my room now, Dad," Lily said softly. Her dad looked up at her, startled, as if he'd just now realized that she was in the room with him. He seemed to take in her words slowly, because after a moment he nodded at her, and went back to looking at his former wife's pictures.  
  
In her room, Lily sat down at her desk, pulled out a piece of paper and a pencil and began to write a list of things. She usually wrote lists about things that were bothering her, which generally helped relieve some of her stress. Mostly, though, not all the time, but it helped some of the time.  
  
This list read:  
My List of Problems: Someone in the magical world murdered Mum. Dad is sinking into depression again. Petunia is marrying the ugliest man I've ever seen. James is prying into my life again. James is Head Boy. I know that I have to find out who murdered Mum, I'm just not sure I want to meet them.  
  
A tear fell onto the paper as everything that had happened that day finally caught up with Lily. She curled up into a little ball on her bed, trying to stifle her little whimpers and sobs in her pillow.  
  
She cried for an hour and a half before finally falling asleep, still clad in her shorts and sleeveless green shirt, curled in a little ball on her bed. 


	5. Early Morning Escapades

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, apart from Alexa and anyone else you might not recognize. The characters that you do recognize from the Harry Potter books all belong to the brilliant imagination of J. K. Rowling. Okay, I'm done now.

Forward Note: Stick around till the end of the chapter, because I will be answering the comments of the reviewers (possibly even your comment or question). Okay, now, on with Friendship Has Its Limits.

Lily jolted into a sitting position, startled awake by a loud sound of something hitting her window. She got out of bed, went over to her window, but before she could open it, another noise sounded, as something met the window. Swallowing her fear temporarily, she opened her window and peered cautiously down toward the ground. Then she ducked back inside her room, a pebble nearly missing her head.

Looking below her again, Lily nearly lost her self-reserve and cursed a very naughty word. "James! What on _earth_ are you doing here at this time of night?" she hissed. She looked at her wristwatch. "It is 3:08 AM, James Potter!"

Before he could respond, Lily shut her window and raced as softly as she could (it wouldn't do if her dad and Veronica---or worse, Petunia---woke up to the sounds of a boy calling on her at this cursed hour of the morning) down the carpeted stairs. She yanked open the front door and stepped out onto the porch, gently closing the door behind her.

"What are you doing here?" she repeated, stomping over to where James Potter stood, his hands in his jacket pockets. She kind of wished that she'd have thought to bring her jacket with her.

James raised an eyebrow at her, and then shrugged. Suddenly feeling self-conscious about her appearance, Lily raked her fingers through her hair. "I just wanted to make sure that you were okay," he said finally.

Lily rolled her eyes at him. "At three o'clock in the morning? Don't be daft, Potter. And do not make the mistake of thinking that I am, either." She crossed her arms over her chest.

"What? I never said---"he began to protest, but much to his annoyance, Lily cut him off, waving her hand in his face angrily.

"Never what, James? Never thought about my feelings?" she hissed, speaking about their past conversation at his house. "I told you not to bring it up! But you never listen to me! Just---just give it up already! You will never know everything about me, and I will never let you just pick at my feelings until I break. I don't know why you came here tonight---"

"I was worried about you!" he said, starting to loose his seemingly never-ending patience with her now. "Aren't I allowed to be worried about my friends? I know you've got something on your mind that bothering you---"

"I'm not telling you---"

"And I know that you aren't ready to tell me about it yet, but I'm worried about you, Lily," he finished, trying to ignore her interruption. "I'm not trying to intrude on your life, honestly, I'm not. I just want to know what's wrong with you."

A gust of wind blew Lily's red hair out of her face, causing her to shiver and get goose bumps all over her skin. She hugged herself, as if she could shelter herself from a lot more than the wind. "I'm not ready to talk about it," she told him softly. "Not yet, anyway."

James nodded understandingly. "When you're ready to talk, I'm here for you." Smiling a little, he added, "I just hope it won't take you six years to talk about it again."

She smiled and even laughed a little, but then shivered again. James took off his jacket and helped her into it. She snuggled into it; it was still warm from his body heat. She smiled up at him, and he smiled back, and once again she was aware of how weird she probably looked. The jacket was huge on her, as James was quite a bit taller than she was; it came down to her knees, covering up her outfit entirely, so it looked as if she were only wearing his coat and nothing else.

Unknowing, the two teenagers had been getting closer to each other. _We're going to kiss again, _Lily thought, but this thought didn't make her pull back. However, just as their lips were almost touching, the porch light turned on, and the door opened, revealing Veronica. Lily jumped back quickly, causing a large gap to form between her and James.

"Lily? Is that you out there? Who's that with you?" Veronica began rapidly shooting out questions. "Do you have any idea what time it is? What are you doing out here? You aren't hurt, are you?"

Lily bit her lip and shot James an apologetic glance before saying, "Don't worry, Veronica, I'll be right inside. Just give me a second, all right? Thanks." She waited until the front door closed again before turning back to James. "I'm really sorry about that."

"Veronica?" His eyes were questioning but not demanding.

She winced. "Yeah. She's my step mum. She and Dad dated for a year, back when I was in fourth year. And then they got married. They've been married for almost three years now."

They stood there awkwardly for a long, agonizing few moments before James finally leaned down and kissed her cheek gently. "I guess I'll see you around then." He turned to leave, but then stopped and looked back. "Oh, and Lily?" When she looked back at him, he said quietly, "Always know that I'm here for you, no matter what time of the day or night, I promise."

"Thanks, James. Goodnight."

Lily stared after his retreating form, wishing that she would just call after him and tell him everything. But she was too much of a coward to do that. Instead she buried her face in his jacket and breathed in the scent of him for a long time before Veronica finally called her back inside.

Author's Note: Sorry about the short chapter. I just thought it was a good place to stop it for the time being. If you don't want to read the comments, just review! Please? Okay, now for answered comments:

Laynie: Just out of curiosity, how do you figure that Lucius was way older than Lils and James? I can't remember if J.K.R. ever said anything about that in the books...By the way, I didn't even know that my separators (for when I change scenes) weren't showing up! I'm sure that would get confusing. I'll try and make them show up. ;) Thanks for letting me know.

Lady of Masbolle: Yeah, Lily was going to have a little brother named Harry, but he died when Mrs. Evans died, trying to give birth to him. But technically, Harry was not really alive, because of the magical cancer. Make sense?

Hermione Elizabeth Granger: I'm glad it isn't too dramatic. You'll find out who murdered Lily's mum sometime later in the fic, I promise. You really didn't think that I'd never add that in, do you? Lol.

Moonsong k'Shallia: Yes, it's true that James needs to work on his people skills, but he's a funny character to mess with, no? He really doesn't know when to keep his mouth shut, does he? Hopefully he'll learn eventually.

Refallen: I'm glad you liked chapter four, and I'm glad that you saw what I was aiming to show in that chapter. I'm sorry that I don't update a whole lot, but I think I've been doing pretty good so far, don't you?

Thanks also to everyone else who reviewed so far: Malibu, ebony-plays-the-viola, trashcan522, SessyLover. Slydawn, and BohemianRaps767. Please keep reviewing!


	6. A Jacket and a Fit of Giggles

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, apart from Alexa and anyone else you might not recognize. The characters that you do recognize from the Harry Potter books all belong to the brilliant imagination of J. K. Rowling. Okay, I'm done now.

"No."

"But that boy is positively adorable! Surely you two are more than friends? What with your beautiful looks, charming personality and his looks, I would think that you two would make the perfect couple!" Veronica looked delighted; it was making Lily sick.

"No," Lily repeated firmly. "I assure you that James Potter and I are just friends, and even that's pushing it sometimes. Sure, we've been on one date, and sure, I have known him since I was eleven, but we are not, I repeat NOT, dating."

"Well, you could've fooled me," Petunia said nastily. She, Lily, Veronica and Mr. Evans were all sitting down at the breakfast table later that morning, discussing James---much to Lily's distaste. Somehow he always managed to make himself the subject of all conversation, even if he wasn't in the same room---or house---of said conversationalists.

"What do you mean, Petty?" asked Lily.

Petunia rolled her eyes at her sister and said as if she were stating the obvious, "You haven't taken his jacket off since he gave it to you. And it's been five and a half hours since your little escapade---"

"I wouldn't call it an escapade, exactly," interrupted Lily thoughtfully.

Petunia rolled her eyes again. "Well, whatever you call it, you were still outside on our front lawn at three o'clock in the morning with a boy. And this boy just happened to give you his jacket, which you have not taken off for five and a half hours."

"James is just my friend. Nothing more than friends, and nothing less than friends, okay? The only reason that I haven't taken his coat off is because it's keeping me warm."

Her sister snickered. "I wasn't aware that it was cold in here---"

It was Lily's turn to roll her eyes. "Just be quiet, Petty, please. I am not willing to explain, yet again, that James Potter and I, Lily Evans, are not dating, and never have been dating."

"But didn't you just say that you did go on one date with him?"

Lily glared at her sister and threw her arms in the air in an exasperated gesture. "I went on ONE date with him, O-N-E. And while it was rather nice, we are still just friends. We have never been anything more than friends, and in fact, until last year, we weren't even really friends. Now I'm going upstairs to relax."

Upstairs in her bedroom, Lily pondered her sister's words. Just because James had given the jacket to her in the first place didn't mean that they were anything more than friends. And just because she still hadn't taken James's jacket off didn't mean that she had more than friendly feelings for him. Right?

This was silly! Of course she only had friendly feelings for James. What else would she have? She _was_ his friendafter all. Not to mention the fact that Lily often thought of James as annoying---or insufferable, depending on her mood. Still, she couldn't shake the thoughts---or emotions, for that matter---that had gone through her mind when James had almost kissed her.

---A few hours later---

Lily stood on the porch of a large house. She was thoroughly awed by the extravagant house. It was light blue in colour, with a white trim, and it was made of wood. There were white lace curtains in the windows, from behind which a pair of eyes was peeking at her. When she rang the doorbell, the eyes disappeared almost immediately, and Lily could hear someone talking for a moment, before a tall woman opened the door. She had glossy, dark brown hair, and gorgeous purple eyes.

"You must be Lily," said the woman, smiling kindly at Lily. "I'm Mrs. Peters, Alexa's mother. She's told me so much about you. Please, come in, dear." From behind Mrs. Peters, a pair of pale eyes watched Lily shyly.

"Thank you, Mrs. Peters," Lily said, smiling politely.

She stepped inside the house after Mrs. Peters, who called up a large staircase, "Alexa! Lily's here!" A short time after that, the sounds of an argument could be heard at the top of the stairs. This lasted for only a moment longer before someone came tumbling down the stairs.

"MOM! Ben pushed me down the stairs!" Alexa cried, standing up and brushing herself off. She went over to the bottom of the stairs and glowered at the boy who was standing at the top.

"Benjamin, don't push your sister down the stairs," Mrs. Peters chided before going through a large living room and into an even larger kitchen. A little girl who looked to be thirteen or fourteen years old scurried after Mrs. Peters hurriedly.

"Hi, Lily," Alexa said, turning away from her brother to look at her best friend. "Sorry about that. That's Benjamin up there, my younger brother. Travis isn't in at the moment, my other brother, I mean. And I believe you saw Caroline running after my mum. She's my youngest---and only---sister."

Lily looked back up the stairs at Benjamin. He came down the staircase to meet her. "You can call me Ben," he said, taking Lily's hand and shaking it. Ben had a head full of curly light brown hair, and his eyes were blue, unlike his mother and sister's eyes. Lily hadn't gotten a good look at Caroline, so she wasn't sure if she had the same purple eyes or not.

Lily smiled politely at Ben, but she began wondering if he was ever going to let go of her hand. But shortly after that, Alexa rolled her eyes, smacked her brother upside the head, and taunted, "Are you ever going to let her go Ben? You know, if you happened to express you little obsession with Lily outside of this house, James would probably kick your---"

Ben blushed brightly, kicked his sister's shin, and ran up the stairs as fast as he could, leaving Alexa looking murderous and Lily looking confused. "Damn brother," Alexa muttered darkly, glaring up the stairs even though Ben was long gone. "I swear, one of these days, he is going to go to sleep, and never wake up."

"He can't be that bad, can he?" Lily asked cautiously. She'd never seen Alexa act this way before, and quite honestly it was scaring her; she didn't know what to expect from her friend now.

"Not that bad?" repeated Alexa in astonishment. "Did you not just see what he did? Add beating me up all the time to constantly talking about you and then ask yourself if he can be 'that bad.' I know you're my best friend and everything, but hearing about you all the time tends to get on one's nerves after a while."

Lily giggled, and not long after that Alexa joined her, until soon both girls had collapsed on the floor, giggling madly and leaning against each other for support. It felt good to finally have something to laugh about, Lily reflected as she clutched at her sides. Finally the two had calmed down enough to agree to go get some ice cream.


	7. Little Green Bikini

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, apart from Alexa and Alexa's family (her mum, dad, sis Caroline, bro Ben, and cousin Ruby) and anyone else you might not recognize. The characters that you do recognize from the Harry Potter books all belong to the brilliant imagination of J. K. Rowling. Okay, I'm done now.

Once seated at the table with their bowels of chocolate peanut butter ice cream (A/N: I absolutely ADORE chocolate peanut butter ice cream. Sorry, anyway, on with the story), Lily asked, "So, Alexa, why did you want me to come here again?"

"Well, first of all, I wanted you to meet my cousin Ruby, who's moving in with us," Alexa replied, licking her spoon. "But she isn't here right now, so that'll happen later. Anyway, my dad wanted to have this barbeque picnic type thingy, too, and so he told me to invite a friend, and so here you are."

"Oh. Cool."

"You don't happen to have a bathing suit with you, do you?" Alexa asked suddenly.

Lily cast a sideways glance at her friend before answering, "You didn't tell me that I was supposed to bring a swimsuit, Alexa, so no, I don't."

The other girl shrugged overly casually, and replied all to readily, "I think you and I might be the same size, so you can borrow one of mine. Although I do think you're a little more gifted in the breast area than I am---"

"Alexa!" Lily blushed crimson. Alexa grinned. "Why do I need a bathing suit anyway?" Lily asked, breaking the momentary silence between the two friends.

"We planned on going swimming in the lake on our property, that's all." Alexa shrugged again. "I hope you don't mind wearing a two piece," she added mischievously. "Eek!" She had to duck to avoid getting smacked.

A few minutes later, both girls were in Alexa's room, Lily sitting on her Queen-sized bed, and Alexa herself ruffling through drawer after drawer in search of a bathing suit for Lily. Apparently Alexa had a thing for two pieced-suits, because every one she had showed Lily so far had been two pieces, and she'd offered at least four suits so far.

"Aha! I knew I had this one tucked away somewhere," Alexa said gleefully, whirling around to face Lily, holding an emerald green two pieced bathing suit. Lily took one look at the swimming suit in question and raised her eyebrows and looked at Alexa as if she thought she was joking.

"You've got to be kidding me." Alexa looked confused. "Alexa, I'd never wear anything like that in my life! I'm not wearing that." Lily crossed her arms over her chest stubbornly.

"Oh come on, Lils! It isn't that bad. Personally I think it'd look a lot better on you than it ever did on me. I've only worn it once. Besides, the color matches your eyes, and clashes in a good way with your hair. Who's going to see it, anyway?"

Lily supposed that Alexa was right; after all, it wasn't like James, Remus and Sirius were going to be there, right? What did she have to lose? Still, she would never have the guts to even _buy _a suit like that, let alone _wear _it.

"Alright, I'll wear it," she agreed finally. She took the bathing suit out of Alexa's hand and turned on her heel to change in the bathroom.

"Lily, you look truly stunning," Alexa said happily once Lily had come back. Lily seriously doubted that; she felt so weird, standing there with her belly, long legs, arms and a good deal of her chest showing. This suit was far beyond her comfort zone. It just showed _way _too much skin.

"Alexa, I don't know about this," she told her friend doubtfully. "I'm not used to wearing anything like this." She shook her head. "But I guess it'll be okay, because it's not like the boys are coming---Wait a minute, Alexa, you didn't invite them did you?"

"Didn't I tell you?" Alexa said innocently. "Dad told me that I should invite all my friends to meet Ruby and have some summer fun. James and Sirius should be here any minute. Remus said that he might be a little late."

"I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU DID THAT!"

Just then the doorbell rang again, and Alexa went racing downstairs at top speed, either to avoid Lily's horrid redheaded temper, or to answer the door before Ben, Lily didn't know, but she went running after her friend. She was halfway down the stairs when Alexa wrenched open the door, revealing James and Sirius.

Lily squealed and ran back up the stairs, realizing that she was still wearing the very showy swimsuit.

"What was that?" asked Sirius. Luckily for Lily, Sirius and James only heard a squeal and only saw a streak of red and emerald green fly up the stairs.

"Come on in, boys," Alexa said, ushering them inside. "That was Lily. She's feeling a bit...shy right now. Take a seat, and I'll go get her. Be back soon!" She went back upstairs, leaving the boys sitting on a couch in the living room, shrugging at each other.

----An hour later...----

"Lily, come on. You look great. Stop stressing about the boys and come out with us to have some fun. You haven't even met Ruby yet." Alexa knocked on the door of her bathroom, where Lily had locked herself in. "Everybody's here, and we're all waiting for you to come outside."

"Fine. But I'm not happy with you, Alexa." Lily unlocked the door and stepped out into Alexa's bedroom, clad in a large white tee shirt, the bathing suit underneath. Alexa rolled her eyes and tried to yank the shirt off Lily.

"Lily, wearing a white shirt won't solve your problem. White's see-through when it gets wet," Alexa reminded her friend. Momentarily distracted about this new piece of information, Lily stopped struggling against Alexa, who then yanked the shirt off of Lily.

Lily glared, Alexa grinned, seemingly unfazed by Lily's death glare, and another girl laughed at both of them. Lily turned to the other girl. She had shoulder length, light brown hair, bright blue eyes, and slightly tanned skin. She was wearing a yellow one pieced suit with blue flowers on it. She smiled at Lily.

"Lily, meet my cousin, Ruby. Okay, okay, now that you've met her, let's go swimming!" Alexa took hold of Lily's arm before she could escape back into the bathroom and pulled her down the stairs and outside, Ruby at her side.

Once out in the backyard, Alexa released Lily and went off toward the lake, Ruby quick on her heels. Lily stayed back a little way, not at all happy with Alexa at the moment. She was going to make a fool out of herself in front of James.

Wait. Since when did she care what James thought of her? She didn't. Right? She took a deep breath and went running after Alexa and Ruby. "Wait for me, you guys!" she called after them. She caught up with them, and they walked to the lake together.

But whatever confidence Lily had talked into herself went right back out again when she spotted James, talking with Remus, Sirius and Mr. Peters. Her breath caught in her throat, and she swallowed.

"I don't think this is such a good idea, Alexa," she said, turning around and trying to run back to the house.

"Oh no you don't, Lily." Alexa latched onto Lily's arm and pulled her back. "You aren't getting it that easily. Now come on." She dragged Lily over to the others, who were all standing around a barbeque grill. "Come on, Lils, shake the lead out of your feet. It's just the guys."

"You planned this all along," Lily accused, and Alexa grinned roguishly at her. "I can't believe you!" She stopped walking and put her hands on her hips. Alexa grinned widened. That's when Lily realized with embarrassment that the boys were all staring at her. She squealed again and turned around only to run into Ruby, who turned her back around.

"Wow Lils, you look...you look..." stuttered James. All the girls looked at him.

"Yes, James?" prompted Alexa. "She looks---amazing? Stunning? Gorgeous?"

"Freaky?" offered Lily. "Disturbing?" Alexa and Ruby frowned at her. "What? I'm just trying to help out."

A/N: Not the greatest ending for the chapter, but hey. Need to leave some stuff for the next chapter, which I already have started. Isn't that great? Now review! This chapter was four pages long, so you ppl shouldn't complain about it being too short! At least I hope it wasn't too short. Sniffs I'm sick, but you can make me happy by leaving a nice long review, k? Until the next chappie, bye!


	8. The Lake Monster

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, apart from Alexa and anyone else you might not recognize. The characters that you do recognize from the Harry Potter books all belong to the brilliant imagination of J. K. Rowling. Okay, I'm done now.

"You look great, Lily," Remus said. "That's what James is trying to say."

"This is so embarrassing, _Alexa,_" Lily said, crossing her arms over her chest and glaring pointedly at Alexa, who smiled innocently at her friend before turning to hug Sirius. Lily hugged herself in the hopes of covering some of her exposed skin.

"So, this is the Lily Evans I've been hearing so much about," said a tall man with black hair and pale blue eyes, who was standing by a barbeque grill near the spot where Lily, Ruby, Alexa, James, Remus and Sirius were all standing.

"Lily, Remus, James, Sirius, this is my dad," Alexa said proudly, releasing Sirius. "Daddy, that's Remus Lupin---"she pointed to Remus---"and that's James Potter---"she indicated James---"this of course is Sirius Black, my boyfriend---"she gave Sirius's hand a squeeze, smiling at him---"and last but not least, the one who is trying to hide behind Ruby is my best friend and Ben's obsession, Lily Evans."

"I am not trying to hide behind Ruby," protested the redhead hotly. Alexa waved her hand dismissively, and Mr. Peters laughed.

"Well, you certainly have an interesting choice in friends, Lexi," chortled her father. He turned back to the barbeque grill. "I'm just about ready to start lunch. You teenagers hungry?"

"Yes!" said Sirius happily, rubbing his stomach. Everyone else laughed.

"You're always hungry, Padfoot." Remus rolled his eyes good-naturedly. He wiped his forehead. "Wow, it's hot out here, isn't it?"

Ruby nodded her head in agreement. "It sure is. I'm just glad it's not raining yet. You know, I think England is one of the rainiest country in the world."

"Ruby grew up in America," Alexa explained. "She still hasn't really gotten used to all the rain here." She smiled fondly at her cousin. "She's my dad's niece, you see. Her mum is my dad's sister, my aunt. She's also Muggle born," she added proudly.

"Really?" said Lily interestedly. "I am too, Ruby. Are you going to be going to Hogwarts then?"

Ruby nodded. "I am. I'm really excited about going. Lexi's told me so much about Hogwarts, and it sounds really great." She smiled brightly at everyone.

"Well, since you girls are so hot---"Remus grinned at James and Sirius, who nodded back at him, smirking.

"Don't you dare---"warned Alexa, but was too late; Sirius, James and Remus pushed Alexa, Lily and Ruby off the dock and into the lake. "You boys are impossible!" Alexa exclaimed loudly once she'd come back to the surface.

Lily surfaced and turned toward the other girls, a mischievous glint in her eyes. The others grinned and went under water, Lily quick to follow them. The boys were still laughing it up when hands wrapped around their ankles and yanked them into the lake.

"You know what they say, boys," said Ruby when the boys surfaced.

"What goes around, comes around," Lily and Alexa chimed in together. They burst into laughter at the sight of the guys' faces.

James was momentarily motionless (well, as motionless as one can be while swimming) as he watched Lily laugh. It was the first time he had seen her truly happy in literally weeks. He could feel a smile forming on his face when she looked at him; happiness about being with her friends made her eyes sparkle with life, like they used to.

He was pulled out of this dream-like trance those dazzling green eyes had put him in when Sirius's weight on his shoulders made him go under water. He came back up spluttering and coughing but laughing nevertheless.

"You've got to start paying attention," Alexa mocked James; she sounded almost exactly like Professor McGonagall did when she caught James sleeping in her class. Lily giggled at Alexa's impression of Professor McGonagall. Ruby smiled, obviously not understanding what was going on, but smiled all the same.

"Sorry, Ruby," Alexa giggled, "you'd understand if you knew who Professor McGonagall is. She's a professor at Hogwarts, our Transfiguration teacher and Head-of-House."

"Oh, that's okay." Ruby smiled at her cousin. She felt movement beneath her feet, but didn't think anything of it; after all, there were five other people with her in the lake that weren't all that far away.

She wasn't the only one who felt movement beneath her feet; in fact all of the teens felt it, but like Ruby, they didn't think anything of it. At least they didn't think much of it until Alexa squealed and grabbed onto Sirius's arm. They all turned to her, startled at her sudden movement.

"Something touched my foot," she said unsteadily, shaking her head and gazing beneath the glassy-looking surface of the lake.

"Maybe it was just one of us, or maybe a fish," Ruby told her cousin reasonably. "There are fish in here, right?"

"Yeah, but it didn't feel like a fish," Alexa replied doubtfully. "It felt like someone's hand or something. And do you really think it was one of us? It just doesn't make any sense." She shook her head again.

"Maybe it was Ben," suggested James. "You know him, always trying to freak you out, Alexa, especially when your friends are over."

"You're probably right, James," she said, but she still didn't let go of Sirius's arm. "Ben is such a jerk sometimes, and since Lily's around, he probably wants to impress her."

"What is---?" James began heatedly, only to be interrupted by Lily's yelp of panic as she was pulled under the lake's surface.

"Okay, Ben, this isn't funny anymore," Alexa said loudly, as Lily struggled to bring herself up to the surface.

"Now what did I do?" Their heads all snapped to the dock, where Ben was sitting cross-legged, watching them. "You can't always blame everything on me, James!" He glared at James pointedly. "I'm up here! I couldn't have touched Alexa's foot!"

Lily broke the surface with a violent splash and took a gulp of oxygen. "Help!" she managed to scream before something pulled her back under. She tried to grab onto anything---anyone---that could help her, but she was being pulled rapidly down toward the bottom of the lake and away from anyone who could possibly help her.

But someone grabbed her outstretched hand and attempted to yank her back, tried to save her. She held onto their hand tightly and tried to swim toward them, but whatever had a hold of her ankle only tightened their grip and yanked her back down. She swam harder, harder, kicking her legs violently against her attacker. She thought she caught him in the head, because she was suddenly released from the death grip, but only for a moment.

Her mouth opened in a silent scream when the attacker grasped her ankle and again tried to pull her to her watery grave; and to make things worse, her fingers were slipping out of her savior's. She was getting dizzy from lack of oxygen; water was filling her lungs and pushing out the oxygen.

When James finally surfaced, he was holding the limp, bluish body of Lily.

Me: Sorry about taking so long to update, but school has started and all, so I haven't had the chance to work on any of my stories, really, but I finally finished this one, so that's good. Review!!


	9. Lilacs

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I own nothing, other than the characters you don't recognize from the Harry Potter series, OK? Those things happen to belong to J.K. Rowling, and as far as I know, my name isn't J.K. Rowling, so therefore I must not own them.

"What are we going to do?" Alexa asked as soon as James had Lily's limp body down on the dock. "Is she breathing James?"

He shook his head, trying not to panic. "I don't think so. We need to do mouth-to-mouth, but who's going to do it?" Everyone looked around at each other. "Doesn't any one know it?"

"I'm going to go get Dad, Lexi," Ben said, getting out of the lake. "He might know what to do, right? I'll hurry back, promise." He ran off toward the house as fast as his legs would take him.

"I think you should do it, Prongs," said Remus. "I mean, Lily is almost technically your girlfriend, even though she keeps denying it."

"I would if I knew CPR, but I don't," James replied, starting to panic a little. "Are you sure no one knows how to do it?"

"I do," said Ruby. "My mom made me go to a class to learn it when I was fourteen." She hoisted herself out of the water and over to where Lily lay. But before she could actually do anything, Mr. Peters was at her side. Ben was standing a little farther back from his father.

"Let me try something I leaned at summer camp when I was your age," Mr. Peters said, turning Lily onto her side. Carefully, he opened her mouth and began to pay her back, rather hard. After about a moment of this, the redhead started to cough up water. Mr. Peters helped her sit up after she had coughed up most of the water in her lungs.

Her eyes open as she took a huge gulp of air. The slight blue tint of her skin caused by lack of oxygen started dissipating, until soon enough her was back to her normally pale skin tone, except for her lips, which were still blue. She tried not to shiver from the cold but didn't do very well.

"What in the world was that _thing_?" she asked breathlessly, taking in as much air as her lungs would allow. "And what made it go for me in the first place? Why not someone else?"

"Perhaps it was only random," suggested Ruby, watching Lily closely. "Maybe whatever _it _was just happened to grab you by coincidence."

Lily looked at her new friend doubtfully. She honestly couldn't think that she hadn't been the one that thing had chosen to drown for a reason. It probably had something to do with finding out about her mother's magically caused death.

"I don't really care what that was or why it tried to drown you at the moment," said James, going over to the shivering Lily. "We need to get some clothes on you before you get hypothermia or something." He helped her up off the ground and supported her body weight by making her lean on him.

"Oh, James relax, please," Lily said, trying unsuccessfully to push James away from her as he lead her back toward the Peters' home. "I'm fine, I promise I won't die on you now."

But James stubbornly refused to release Lily from his grip until they were all the way back to the house and inside. Once she had changed back into her dry clothing Lily went back downstairs to announce that she should probably get back to her house before her dad started to worry or something.

"Would you like a ride home, dear?" Mrs. Peters asked Lily kindly. "It's an awfully long walk back to your house."

"You really don't have to, Mrs. Peters," said Lily genuinely. "I could always walk. It really isn't that far, and I could always use the exercise." She offered a small smile for Alexa's mother.

"Nonsense," said Mrs. Peters, wiping her wet hands on her apron. She had been washing dishes, but she stopped in order to speak with Lily. She apparently wasn't going to take no for an answer. "I was going to take James home anyway. Come on, dear."

Lily said goodbye to her friends, and told Alexa she'd call her later to talk. Together she, James and Mrs. Peters left the house. Lily was dropped off first, since James lived further away from the Peters' house than Lily did. She stood in the front lawn and watched the car until it turned around a corner. Then she went inside her house.

Her father and Veronica were in the front room, sitting next to each other on the couch. Mr. Evans had Veronica's hands cupped in both of his, looking pale. Veronica was looking rather pleased, though also pale. She looked up as Lily walked in.

"Oh Lily," she said happily, grinning up at her step daughter, "just wait until you hear the good news."

"What good news?" Lily asked, smiling a little. Veronica's enthusiasm was contagious.

"I'm pregnant!"

"What?" All Lily could do was stare stupidly at Veronica. Her words couldn't seem to register in Lily's mind. It was like her brain had suddenly gone numb.

"Isn't it fabulous? We just got the results from the doctor," Veronica continued, oblivious to Lily's lack of reaction. "I'm four weeks along. Oh, this is wonderful, isn't it dear?"

Mr. Evans looked up finally, and did the thing that finally woke his daughter up. He looked right at her, and smiled. He was _happy_ that Veronica was pregnant. It was like he had completely forgotten what had happened almost five years ago to Lily's real mother. Something snapped into place in her mind finally. Veronica was pregnant, with her father's baby.

"How could you do this?" she asked, her voice barely even a whisper. She stared directly at her father. "_Why_ would you do this to me?" Veronica watched Lily with a look of shock on her face. Her father's smiled faded. "Did you forget what happened to Mum? What were you thinking?"

"Angel, of course I haven't forgotten about Mum," her father said, his expression and voice pained.

"Then why would you do this?" she cried. "Why would make me go through everything all over again? I can't do it again, Dad, I can't. I can't watch history repeat itself. You can't ask that of me! I'm seventeen! How could you?" Her voice caught in her throat, and she tried to hold back the tears that pushed behind her eyes.

"Lily, you aren't being fair---"

"Fair?" she shouted back, interrupting him. "_I'm_ not being fair? What about you? How is getting _her_---" she pointed to Veronica---"pregnant being fair to any of us? Mum died when she was pregnant, and so did the baby, if I have to remind you. For nine months I watched my mother die, and now I might have to go through it all over again, because _I'm_ not being fair!"

Lily ran to the door, wrenched it open, and slammed it shut behind her. How could he do this to her, to her mum? He acted as if he'd forgotten all about Adrienne Evans. It was almost as if he wanted to forget about her, to pretend that she'd never existed. Why was he doing this?

She walked down the sidewalk a ways before crossing the street and entering the park her mother used to take her and Petunia to when they were little kids, where she sat down on a swing. She closed her eyes and let her feet push her along the ground. The wind blew from behind, causing her hair sweep gently across her cheeks.

She swung back and forth, back and forth, the way her mum used to rock her to sleep at night. The motion of the swing combined with the wind gently pushing her calmed her down and erased all thoughts from her mind. She took in deep breath, and her nose filled with the scent of lilacs. Her mum used to smell like lilacs.

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Me: Sorry it's taken me so long to update. I've had a really hard time trying to write anything lately, with school and life in general, but now that I'm on Winter Break, I figured I could find the time to write some of my chapters. Please review, please?


	10. Explosion

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I own nothing, other than the characters you don't recognize from the Harry Potter series, OK? Those things happen to belong to J.K. Rowling, and as far as I know, my name isn't J.K. Rowling, so therefore I must not own them.

"You know, James, I've been thinking," said Mrs. Potter as soon as James had walked in the door. James looked at her apprehensively. Whenever his mother told him that, she always told him some insane story about why he'd turned out the way he had or something like that.

"Oh?" was all he could say.

"Yes. I've finally come up with a theory," she said somewhat excitedly, "about you becoming Head Boy." _Here we go,_ James thought, rolling his eyes at the ceiling. "You couldn't possibly have been made Head Boy, you see, because you were never a prefect, and only prefects can become Head Boy or Girl. It has to be a mistake!"

"Well then," responded James, "why do I have a letter from Hogwarts, signed by Professor Dumbledore himself stating that I, James Isaac Potter, am the new Head Boy, and why do I have a badge that says 'Head Boy' on it?"

Mrs. Potter stared at her son blankly for a moment before telling him flatly, "I haven't thought of that yet, if you must know. But I'm sure that he's just made a mistake, that's all. It's the only explanation of how you managed to get that shiny little badge with 'Head Boy' written on it."

"Why is it so impossible for me to have gotten Head Boy?" James cried in exasperation.

His mother walked out of the room, coming back a few moments later with a shoebox over-flowing with papers. She set it down on the table with a loud _thump._ She selected a paper at random and began to read it aloud.

"'Dear Mrs. Potter, your son, James, has been involved in an incident with one Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew, regarding several stink bombs in the girls' lavatories on the fourth floor. We have addressed him on said issue, and we thought it best to inform you of your son's misbehaviours.'"

She selected another letter from the box and read that one, too. "'Dear Mrs. Potter, your son, James, has been caught by our caretaker, Argus Filch, switching out all of the school's quills with sugar quills he and Remus Lupin purchased in Hogsmeade…'"

Another read, 'Dear Mrs. Potter, James, along with Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew, have stolen all of the girls' skirts, and cut them below regulation length…'

Other letters included the incident in which James turned Lily Evans' hair scarlet and gold that glowed in the dark for a record four days straight, bubble gum in a straw that happened to land in a third-year Hufflepuff's hair, putting Levitating Sherbet Balls in all the food in the Great Hall, and various tricks played on one Severus Snape.

"Okay, okay, I get the point, _Mum_," James said, pushing the shoebox away from him.

His mother only shrugged and dropped in the letters she had taken out back into the box and replaced it in her bedroom on the floor of the closet. "That's why it's impossible for you to have gotten to be a Head of the school," she said when she came back. "Fancy a cup of tea?"

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Lily wasn't sure just how long she sat in that park on the swing, but she was sure she hadn't been there for long when a shadow passed over her. She looked up to see the blurry but familiar outline of a certain messy-haired, glasses-wearing, seventeen-year-old boy.

Wiping her eyes, she asked in a tired voice, "What are you doing here James?" She hadn't realized until she heard her voice come out that she was exhausted, tired of having to deal with so much all at once.

"I was about to ask you the same thing," James responded, taking the swing beside her and sitting in it. "I couldn't take much more of my mum's 'theories' about how I came about being Head Boy."

Lily had almost forgotten about James being Head Boy. It seemed like it had been forever ago that it'd happened. "I'm sorry to beat that, but---Veronica, my step mum, is four weeks pregnant."

His jaw dropped. "You're kidding!" he blurted, but the look on Lily's face told him that she wasn't kidding. "How could your dad make you go through that again?"

She just shrugged, and looked around her at all the families in the park, mums reading on benches, keeping their eyes on the little kids running around and yelling, and dads teaching their sons to play baseball. Once again she was reminded of the fact that her own family used to come to this park, back when everything was good.

"You know, my mum used to take me here all the time when I was little," she said quietly, a tiny smile appearing on her face. "She always tried to me to play with the other little kids, but I wouldn't. I'd always sit beside her on the bench and make her read to me, back when I didn't know how to read."

James didn't know what to say, and he wasn't sure if Lily wanted him to respond anyway.

"Sometimes I pretend they didn't die that day in the hospital," she said after a moment, her voice getting caught in her throat. "I pretend that Mum came home with a squirming little bundle wrapped in blue, and I'd be jumping around her, asking if I could hold baby Harry. She'd let me, of course, and when I look at him, I'd see that he had her eyes---my eyes."

"It wasn't fair that they were both taken from you," he told her softly, reaching out to touch her shoulder. "It must have felt awful, and now with your dad and Veronica and everything---"

"It still does," she sighed, turning to look at him. "You have no idea how much it hurt to let her go, and when I finally did I learn that someone wantedher dead. James, they _killed_ her on purpose."

He stared at her. "What?"

She nodded, not looking away from him. "She and Harry both died of magical cancer, and according to her doctor it was given to her from someone in the wizarding world."

"Is there a chance her doctor could be wrong? How---"

"No, James, there isn't. Her doctor's a Squib, and I saw a sample of Mum's blood myself, and there's no mistake about it; she didn't die of natural causes." She shrugged out of his grip on her shoulder and headed back to her house.

"Lily, wait!" he called after her, but she didn't stop or even turn back. She just kept walking along the sidewalk, letting her feet take her home. She couldn't explain it, but she had this feeling in her stomach that made her think that for some reason, she _needed_ to get back to the house.

The frantic feeling urged her to hurry, and suddenly her feet were pounding against the pavement as she ran toward her house as fast as her legs would take her. By the time she reached her destination her face was sweating, and her bangs were plastered to her forehead. She yanked the door open and ran inside.

"Dad? Veronica?" she yelled, her heart pounding as adrenaline pumped through her system. "Dad! DAD!"

Time slowed down the moment she saw it---a rune glowing in bright blue on the wall in the foyer. From her Ancient Runes class she knew what it meant---explosion. Her mind took a few seconds to register the rune and what it was supposed to do, and in those precious seconds she wasted the time to escape or warn them before it happened.

The force of the explosion blew her right through the door and into the street.

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Me: I want to say sorry for the way the last chapter started out, you know about how her friends reacted to Lily's almost-drowning-incident. I know they seemed a little too calm for her almost _dying, _but like I said, I was having a hard time writing, and I had an especially hard time writing that part. I did realize it, however, so thanks to Hermione Elizabeth Granger and ebony-plays-the-viola, who both pointed it out to me.

By the way, ebony, thanks for the suggestion of making a girl for Remus and naming her Ruby…(I know you made it back in chapter 2, but hey…) I used your idea, hope you don't mind, lol!


	11. Time

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I own nothing, other than the characters you don't recognize from the Harry Potter series, OK? Those things happen to belong to J.K. Rowling, and as far as I know, my name isn't J.K. Rowling, so therefore I must not own them.

It felt like time had finally sped up and left her behind, moving in slow motion, because suddenly there were loads of people all around what was left of her house. Sirens blared and lights flashed and people chattered all around her, but the noises and lights just blended together and dulled, until she could barely even hear any of it.

She was laying in the middle of the street, staring up at the sky that was filling with smoke, listening to her laboured breathing. Her heart was pounding against her rib cage so hard her chest was starting to ache. She could feel what felt like a million pairs of eyes on her, but somehow she couldn't seem to get up.

And then the sound of feet pounding on the pavement near her brought someone to her side. Strong arms wrapped around her and tried to help her sit up. The first thing she saw when she was in the sitting position was her house---or more like the ruins of her house.

"Oh, God…" She jerked out of the strong arms that held her and started running for her house---her dad was in there, her _dad!_ ---but someone reached out and grabbed her arm, stopping her. She whipped around and found her face nearly touching the face of Potter. "James! What are you---let go of me!"

"Lily, wait! You can't go in there!" he was yelling after her, but she wasn't listening. She had jerked out of his grip on her wrist and tore off toward her house. Before he could stop her, she was already inside. "LILY!"

First she ran to the living room, but she already knew her dad wasn't in there; she'd seen that before the explosion, so she headed for the kitchen next. There was broken glass everywhere, from shattered windows, tea mugs, and plates, along with the splinters of the table and chairs, which had been torn to pieces. Lying among the glass and splinters of wood was her dad, blood splatters all over the floor around him and the clothes he was wearing.

She ran over to him the moment she saw him lying there in a puddle of his own blood, not hesitating for even a split second. "Daddy?" she said softly, bending down to see if he was breathing. "Daddy? Please be okay, Daddy, please be okay…"

"Lily?" her father choked out, coughing and gripping her hand in his in such a tight hold that it hurt. "What happened, Lily? What was that explosion?"

"Daddy I'm so sorry about yelling at you about getting Veronica pregnant," Lily whispered, tears stinging her eyes. "I'm sorry I ran out of the house like that, and saying that you forgot about Mum."

"Oh, Lilykins, that's not---" He started coughing again, and Lily's heart slammed against her chest. Her ribs ached so much, but she didn't even feel the pain. All she could really focus on was her dad, lying there on the kitchen floor with pieces of glass and wood and blood all over his clothes.

"Ma'am, I need you to step away from your father now," said a deep but gentle voice from the kitchen doorway. Lily turned away from her father to see two male paramedics standing there, holding a stretcher between them. "Ma'am?" he said again, when Lily didn't move.

She finally backed away enough so that the men could get through to her father. But she stood near them and watched while they carefully lifted Mr. Evans onto the stretcher and carried him outside of the house, beckoning her to come along. She followed the men who now carried her (probably dying, a nasty voice said in her mind) father in a daze, as if she couldn't really believe what had happened.

"C-can I come w-w-with you?" she asked the paramedics hesitantly while they loaded her father into the back of an ambulance. "Please?"

"I'm afraid not, miss," said one of them, who then ran to the front of the vehicle and opened the door to get in and drive.

She stopped the man who was just about to close the back doors, begging him to let her in there. "_Please!_ He's my dad; I have to go with him! Just let me come with you, please? _I'm his daughter!_"

"Look, you heard what he said," the paramedic told her impatiently, trying to close the doors, but she had grabbed hold of one of them and refused to let it go. "Ma'am, please step away from the truck!"

James came up from behind her and pulled her body away from the truck, forcing her to look at him. She fought against him as hard as she could, but she couldn't seem to break free of his vice-like grip. All the while she just kept saying over and over again, "He's my dad! He's my dad!"

Finally she stopped struggling against him, just falling limply against his chest, and he finally dropped his tight hold on her. As soon as he had, she yanked out of his grip (as she'd been counting on him to do just what he had) and, pulling out car keys out of her front pocket, ran down the street a ways until she finally spotted her dad's black Austin Healey. She quickly got the door unlocked and open when James caught up with her.

"What are you doing?" he demanded as she hung half in and half out of the car

"I'm going to the hospital," she told him flatly. "I need to see my dad, _now._ I have to make him forgive me for saying those horrible things about Veronica and---Mum, before something happens---" She sucked in a breath and got in the car. "Are you coming, or are you going to stay here?"

He just stared at her, mouth agape, until he finally said, "My mum, she'll wonder where I am if I go with you, Lily."

She shrugged and started the car. "You can call her from the hospital, if you're really that worried about that. But if you don't want to come with me, fine." She closed her door and started the car, but before she could pull away from the curb, James had opened the other door and was getting inside.

Nodding grimly at him, Lily pointed to the seat belt. "Buckle up."


	12. Breathe

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I own nothing, other than the characters you don't recognize from the Harry Potter series, OK? Those things happen to belong to J.K. Rowling, and as far as I know, my name isn't J.K. Rowling, so therefore I must not own them.

"Are you sure you're in a fit state to drive?" James asked Lily again as she rode up on a curb for the third time as they skidded around yet another corner. Her driving scared him, and that wasn't just because he wasn't used to being in a car.

"No," she answered honestly, not looking at him as she righted the car on the road again. "But I don't trust you with a car, either, so I suppose we're even."

"I never said I didn't trust you," James protested, looking at her through the corner of his eye. "I just asked if you were in a fit state to operate this…thing. Isn't there some other way of getting there?"

"If you're referring to a magical way of getting there, no," she replied rather tersely. "I really don't think MOM would be too happy if I used floo powder to get to a Muggle hospital, so Apparating is also out of the question in that case, and I really don't want to sit around and wait for a bus, either."

From then on James decided to keep his mouth closed about Lily's state of being/ability to drive. It was strange to see her like this, frightened and helpless, but most importantly she was in that river in Egypt---denial. And the worst part about that was that he was pretty sure this was one thing he might not be able to help her with no matter how hard he tried.

"There's the hospital, right there," she said, nodding her head toward a large brick building with a lot of windows. The parking lot was fairly empty, so she didn't have to really decide where to park her father's car. She pulled sharply into a parking space beside a red sports car and quickly shut off the engine. She didn't speak to James as they both half-jogged to the hospital entrance. "I need to see my dad," she told the receptionist. "He probably just got here with the paramedics. He has red hair like mine, last name Evans."

"You'll have to wait in the lobby," the receptionist responded, stapling a stack of papers together. "The doctors need to have some space while they work on your father. You can see him when they're done."

"What room is he in, can you tell me?" At the look of doubt on the woman's face, she added hastily, "I promise not to go in there. I just want to be there for him when they get done. Please, please just tell me the room he's in. He's my dad."

The woman chewed her bottom lip for a moment, and then reluctantly told Lily the operating room her dad was in. The redhead thanked the woman profusely before following her directions of where to go, James quick on her heels. But just as she promised she would not do, Lily went barging into the room before James could stop her. He hesitated for a moment outside of the operating doors, where he could see Lily's father surrounded by people. A blonde-haired man was trying to get Lily out of the room, and through the door James could hear her protesting loudly.

"I just want to be with my dad! Is that too much to ask? He's my father! Just let me stay with him, please!" The blonde man was now physically trying to push Lily out of the room, because she seemed to have rooted her legs to the spot and wouldn't move. James pushed through the doors in time to hear the man saying, "Miss, please. You need to let the doctors work!"

"C'mon, Lily." James gently tugged at Lily's hand. "They'll let you see your dad when they're done working on him. The longer you're in here the more you're distract these people from saving your dad. Come on, Lily, please. Let's just go right out here by the doors."

He was about to pick her up and carry her out of the room when she glanced over at her dad laying on the hospital bed, and finally nodded her head, letting James lead her out of the room. He sat her down in the waiting room on a chair and sat beside her. Silence settled between the two teenagers like a blanket. Ten minutes passed before either of them said a word, and it was James who first broke the silence.

"I'm sure he's going to be fine, Lils. It'll just take some time." He looked over at her; she just stared straight ahead not moving except for the occasional blink.

He wasn't sure she was going to answer him, so instead he looked at his lap. He was surprised when, after another long minute of silence, she responded. "Do you really think he's going to be okay?"

She sounded small and helpless, like a little girl who had just dropped her ice cream cone on the ground. He looked at her again, and this time she turned to look at him, too. Her green eyes were open wide and shining with unshed tears, and all he wanted to do was take her in his arms and promise her that everything was going to be fine, that her dad was going to get better, and that her world would keep turning, but he knew he couldn't promise anything like that. Instead he took her hand in his and didn't say anything, just looked at her knowing that all she wanted to hear was reassurance, not necessarily the truth.

A few minutes later a man in a white smock came into the waiting room, looking grim. Lily looked at him expectantly, hoping he had good news. "You can see him now," he told her, sticking his hands in his pockets. Lily shot up out of the chair and went running for the doors that separated her from her dad. The man stopped James before he followed her into the room. "I'm afraid he's not in good condition. I don't think he's going to make it through the night."

All the breath in James's lungs left his body the second the doctor said what he had. Lily's dad was going to die before the night ended, and there was nothing anyone could do about it. For a moment all he could do was gawk at the doctor, but finally he nodded and headed for the room mutely.

Lily was leaning over her dad and talking to him in a whisper. James wasn't sure that he would be able to stand being in there with her for long. He stood in the doorway awkwardly for a few minutes before leaving the room in search of a phone to call Alexa with. Lily had suggested that he call his mum when they got to the hospital, but she'd forgotten that James's parents were magical and didn't own a phone, so he decided to call Alexa to tell Sirius to go home and tell his mum where he was. Alexa had taught James how to use the phone two summers ago, which at the time he thought had been stupid and pointless, but now he was glad that she had.

"Hello, Peters residence, this is Ben speaking."

"Ben, this is James, get Alexa and tell her to hurry because it's really important, okay?" He prayed that Alexa's bratty brother would just once listen to him. "It's about Lily, if that makes you hurry any more."

There was a muffled silence on the other end before Alexa's voice came on. "James? What's going on? Ben said it was about Lily. What happened?"

James explained everything that had happened from when he found Lily at the park to when her house blew up. Alexa didn't say anything while he was telling her, just gasped in horror when he told her that Lily's dad probably wasn't going to make it through the night. She quickly agreed to tell Sirius to go home and tell his mum where he was. She also told him to be sure to take care of Lily until she could get there.

Just as he was hanging up the phone, James heard Lily shriek. He ran down the hall, almost skidding right past the room, and pushed through the doors. A high-pitched ringing filled his ears, and it wasn't coming from Lily. A machine next to the bed Mr. Evans was on was showing a picture of a straight bright green line on its screen and was making a terrible ringing sound. He looked to the bed and saw Mr. Evans, his face pale as ash, just lying there with his eyes closed, not moving. He realized in horror that not even his chest was rising and falling.

A/N: Wow, long chapter, huh? 1461 words, not including the disclaimer and author's note. You'll all be happy to know that I've already started chapter 13, so hopefully it won't take me so long to update again. Please review!


	13. Emotions Strung High and Lying Doctors

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters you recognize as J. K. Rowling's, obviously.

Hurriedly James yelled for help, and a team of nurses and a doctor came rushing in the room. He looked at Lily, whose colour had drainer from her face, standing by the bed, still holding her father's hand. The doctors tried to push her out of the way, but she wouldn't budge.

"Don't leave me, Daddy," she was saying in a rush. "You're all I have left! You can't leave me yet. I'm only seventeen! I still _need_ you! Don't leave me, please don't leave me." James tried to get her out of the way, but she wouldn't move. "Please don't abandon me like Mum did. I don't think I can take it! I can't live without you!"

"Miss, you need to get out of the way now!"

"Lily! Come on! You're in the way. You're going to kill your dad if you don't get out of the way!" That caused her to turn and look at him in shock. James took advantage of the moment, grabbed Lily around the waist, and pulled her out of the way. As soon as she was out of the way, the doctor took over her spot, shouting orders to the nurses around him.

This time James did have to physically pick Lily up to get her away from her father. He grabbed her around the waist and hoisted her over his shoulder, which wasn't a very difficult thing to do, since Lily weighed next to nothing. Surprisingly she didn't struggle to get out of his arms, but when he finally set her down back in the waiting room, which was completely empty apart from them, she pushed him away from her and went pacing around the room frantically.

"Lily…" James started tentatively. She didn't even cast a glance his way, just kept pacing. "Lily, there's something you need to know, something the doctor told me---˝

She turned toward him, looking panicked. "I've got to tell Petunia. She doesn't know…and Veronica. I don't think she was in the house at the time, but she needs to know, needs to be here with him. Petunia needs to know. She'll be angry if I don't tell her."

She was babbling, he knew. It was probably part of the whole post-traumatic stress thing. Wordlessly he pointed in the general direction of the phones, and she instantly followed his finger to the phone to call her sister. As soon as she was out of sight, James collapsed into a chair and shoved a hand through his hair. He wasn't sure how to handle this kind of situation, and he sure as heck wasn't used to seeing strong, seemingly invincible Lily torn and broken like she was, left helpless to watch as her father's life slowly ebbed away from him. There was nothing magically that he could do for her now; all that was left was emotional support.

Lily inserted a coin into the payphone and dialled the number of Petunia's new flat, which she shared with Vernon. She let it ring, and ring, and ring, and ring some more before she finally hung up the phone, convinced that her sister was the only one in the entire world without an answering machine. Unsure of what to do next, she stood there in the middle of the hall for a few long minutes until finally she forced her legs to carry her back to the waiting room.

She resumed her pacing as soon as she was back. From time to time she'd cast a glance at James, who was still seated in the plastic chair with his head in his hands. For over half an hour they stayed like that, each lost in their own thoughts, until Alexa, Sirius, Ruby and Remus finally arrived. The instant the four other teens arrived James jumped up from the chair and went to greet them. Lily, however, continued to pace, unaware that more people had entered the room. James caught the newcomers up to speed with what was going on, and grimly motioned toward the pacing Lily when Sirius asked how she was doing.

All of a sudden, Lily fell heavily into a chair behind her, her hands at her temples. The others quickly hurried over to her, but Alexa reached her first, crouching on her knees in front of Lily's chair. She reached up and smoothed the redhead's hair out of her face.

"I don't think I can deal with this." Lily's soft, whispered voice echoed off the hospital walls. "I can't, Alexa, I can't watch another parent die. It's not fair!" Her voice went from whispered to yelling in no time at all.

"Oh, Lily…I wish you didn't have to do this either," Alexa replied, her voice obviously pained. "It isn't fair, not in the least little bit. My mum and dad want you to stay with us, at our house, until you get back on your feet."

Lily shoved her face in her hands and moaned. It was a long, sorrowful note, full of pain and exhaustion, but it didn't even _begin_ to describe how she was feeling. The emotions inside her were too raw to express through speaking or other sounds. She just wanted this---all this, the pain, the sadness, the anger---everything to just go away. She wanted the whole entire world to disappear, taking her with it. Why did she have to do this again? Wasn't watching her mum die enough? Wasn't loosing one parent enough? Apparently not.

She stood up and started pacing again, but Ruby grabbed her arm, forcing the redhead to look at her. "Lily, babe, I know this is hard, but you don't have to go through this alone. You have us, your friends. We're here for you."

"I don't know how I'm expected to go through this," Lily whispered, her voice desperate sounding. "And I know you guys shouldn't have to be here with me, but…I just, I don't know how anyone is supposed to do this kind of thing. I don't know what to do."

"Like Ruby said, we are your friends, Evans, whether you like it or not," Sirius told her firmly, rewarded with a small snort of laughter from Lily. "Friends are supposed to be there when something's going wrong. That's what they're practically expected to do, you know. It's part of the job description, to stick around even when things are looking dark."

Just then the doctor came out, and Lily rushed up to him, hope shining brightly in her eyes. "Miraculously we were able to get your father stabilized. He's breathing again, though with the help of a machine. However, I must tell you that his chances for ever coming off the machine are very slim."

"But he's going to be okay?" she asked, obviously not caring about her father being hooked up to machines or not. "He'll be okay, right?"

The doctor glanced over Lily's shoulder at her friends, who stared back with solemn faces. Clearly he was hoping to get an easy way out of this by having her friends distract her with something, but it wasn't going to come. "His chances of survival don't look good right now," he said finally. "But there is a small possibility that he'll make it."

"Thank you, so much!" she said, a smile creeping over her face as her entire body relaxed. "Thank you for saving my father, doctor. You have no idea how relieved I am to hear that!"

"I'll need a number where to reach you at in case there is any changes over the night," the doctor continued. "I'm afraid you can't really stay here."

Alexa came forward and recited her phone number to the doctor. "Of course she isn't going to stay here! She's coming home with us, where she should be. Thank you for your help, doctor." She looped her arm through Lily's and walked back to the others. "Come on, Lily. Let's get you out of here."

"Hang on. I want to see my dad before we go," she replied, looking over her shoulder at the place where the doctor had been standing. "I'll only be a minute."

"Of course," said Ruby, smiling. Lily gave her a small smile in return before walking away.

"That guy was lying to her, wasn't he?" James asked roughly as soon as the redhead was out of sight. "Her dad probably isn't going to make it, is he? I bet that doctors are required to try and make the families of patients feel better by lying to them."

No one answered him, but it was clear that they were all thinking the same thing: Mr. Evans probably wasn't going to make it, and there wasn't nothing any of them could do, other than maybe help Lily get through it. Maybe.

A/N: Another long chapter, eh? A lot of my chapters have been getting longer lately, which isn't a problem for the readers out there, I'm sure. Anyway, I know the last few chapters have been depressing, and let me tell you now that the next few ones will be, too. It'll get better eventually though, but I'm not going to get into that now.


	14. Numb

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters you recognize as J. K. Rowling's, obviously, or else I'd be worth more money than the queen of England, know who the half-blood prince is, etc, which I'm not, and I don't.

The six teenagers left the Muggle hospital together, but went their separate ways after that, the three girls to the Peters' home, James and Sirius to the Potters', and Remus to his own house. Since Lily had driven to the hospital in her dad's car and Alexa had borrowed her mum's car, they decided that Lily would follow Alexa and Ruby home. Alexa had wanted Ruby to go with Lily at first, but Lily said that she kind of wanted to be alone, so Ruby went with Alexa.

As they pulled out of the parking lot, Lily turned on the car radio, changed it to her favourite station, and cranked the volume until her ears almost couldn't take it anymore. She was hoping to drown out her thoughts with music, and it worked for a time, until she followed Alexa onto the main road that lead to her house half an hour later. It was then she realized that she wasn't going to her house again, ever. As she killed the engine and got out of the car, she tried to push all thoughts like that out of her head. She just couldn't deal with that yet.

Ruby put her arms around the redhead's shoulders and walked her up to the house, where Mrs. Peters was waiting on the front porch for them to return, along with a petite, frail looking young girl with pale blue eyes and light brown hair that fell limply to her shoulders. Lily figured this was Alexa's sister, Caroline, but wasn't sure.

"Oh, you're back," said Mrs. Peters, standing up from the deck chair she'd been sitting in to greet the girls. She sounded slightly worried. "Lily, I'm terribly sorry to hear about your father. I hope you know that you're certainly welcome to stay here for as long as you need. We're certainly happy to have you."

"Thanks," the redhead muttered almost inaudibly. Alexa watched her friend with carefully hidden pity, as she knew Lily would not be pleased with her if she let her friend know that she pitied her. But how could Alexa _not_ feel bad for her? She was probably going to loose the only sort of parent she had left, after all.

"Ah, Misses Evans and Peters," said a voice from behind them. The girls turned around to see Professor Dumbledore standing there, looking at them grimly. He held his hand out to Ruby, who shook it. "Ruby Timminson, I presume," he said, smiling politely. "I'm Professor Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts. It's a pleasure to meet you."

"Likewise," Ruby replied, forcing herself to smile at the old man. He seemed nice enough, but she couldn't seem to make herself smile, partially because of everything that was going on at the moment. "I'm just sorry we had to meet on such…stressful circumstances."

"Ah, yes," the headmaster said, shaking his head grimly. "About that, Miss Evans, if you'll please come with me, I'd like to talk to you about something. Ask you some questions, and that."

Lily swallowed and nodded, following Dumbledore into the Peters' front lawn. She raked her fingers through her hair in the hopes of looking somewhat better. "Yes, Professor?"

"What exactly happened?"

"I, uh…I found out that my stepmother was pregnant and kind of…flipped out," she said awkwardly, shifting her weight from one foot to another. "I left the house for about fifteen to twenty minutes at the most, and when I came back, I, um, noticed that there was a rune glowing in blue in my foyer. From taking Ancient Runes, I knew it meant explosion, but I…wasn't fast enough to warn them."

Dumbledore sighed. "I'm terribly sorry to hear about your father's current condition," he said, "but I need to know where you'll be staying for the remainder of the holidays."

She looked up, a confused look on her face. "Here," she answered, as if it were obvious. "Where else would I stay?"

He smiled slightly. "As one would assume," he responded, nodding. "Well, I had better get back to the school, you know, things to get in order before everyone comes back and all. I look forward to seeing you back there."

She nodded as well, not trusting herself to speak. Then she somehow managed to find her way back up the porch steps to where everyone else was standing.

"Lily dear, would you like something to eat, or a drink perhaps? I could make some tea," Mrs. Peters offered. The young girl stood behind her, almost as if she were afraid to be too far away from her. "By the way, this is my other daughter, Alexa's younger sister, Caroline. She's a tad bit shy, but she'll warm up to you."

"No she won't," Alexa said. Her mother gave her an exasperated look. "What? Caroline hasn't warmed up to anyone but you, Mum, and I don't think she ever will. She barely even speaks to us, and we're her family. Why would Lily be any different?"

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At two o'clock in the morning, the telephone rang, its loud ringer echoing through the entire house. Mrs. Peters sat up in bed, shook her husband's sleeping form, and flipped on the light. Mr. Peters hurried down the stairs and to the kitchen, where he snatched up the phone. He'd barely even said hello before Alexa and Ruby both came down the stairs in their robes. They watched Mr. Peters closely.

"Yes, she's here. Hold on a moment, let me have someone go and fetch her from bed," he was saying, and gestured to Alexa to go upstairs and get Lily. Ruby looked at him expectantly, and all he did was shake his head. Her heart immediately sank. "Yes, I understand what this means. No, I'll let you tell her."

A moment later Alexa came back into the kitchen, Lily in tow. The redhead was rubbing at her eyes sleepily, not seeming to understand what was going on. Mr. Peters handed her the phone, and she took it, trying to force her eyes to stay open.

"Hello? Yes, this is she." The tiredness fell away as soon as she heard the doctor's voice on the other line. "What?" she whispered, clutching the phone to her ear with both hands. "A-are you sure? I mean, you could have made a mistake---"

She must have been cut off by the doctor, Alexa thought, because Lily looked like she was trying really hard to understand what was happening. She could pretty much figure out by herself why the doctor was calling.

"Oh," the redhead said in a small voice. "T-t-thank you for calling to let me know. I'll be by later to…yeah. I'll be by later." She set the phone back on the cradle with a small click. Her body suddenly felt as if twenty-pound weights had been attached to everything, including her eyelids. She straightened up and took a deep breath before turning back to the others.

"Lily, are you…okay?" Ruby asked, feeling ridiculously stupid as soon as she'd said the words. Of course she wasn't okay; she'd just lost her only other parent and was now an orphan. How would she be okay?

"I just need some air," she responded in a breathy voice, as if she'd just run two miles without stopping. "I just need air, and I'll be fine." She rushed to the back door, yanked it open, and ran out into the backyard. Alexa and Ruby both followed her, and Ruby managed to make it in time to hold back her red hair while she vomited into the grass.

"Come on, babe, let's go back inside." Ruby helped the redhead up off the ground, and tried to wrap her arm around her shoulders, but Lily pushed her away.

"I just need some air," she repeated, shying from Alexa's arm, too. "I think I'm going to take a walk." Both girls nodded and watched helplessly as Lily headed toward the fence that lead into the front yard.

"Wait, Lily, at least take a jacket!" Alexa called after her. She stopped, turned around, and stared numbly at her friends. Alexa ran inside, grabbed a jacket at random, and ran it over to Lily. Coincidentally, the jacket Alexa happened to grab was the one that James had given to her not too long ago. Lily slipped into it and pulled it tightly against her body, welcoming the comforting smell it brought her.

She then turned around and headed out of the gate, crossed the lawn, and walked at a steady pace down the street. Sighing, Alexa turned to Ruby, who went over to her cousin and looped her arm through hers.

"What now?" Ruby asked, and Alexa started walking to the house.

"We call the boys and tell them, I guess."


	15. Family Matters

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I don't own it. Period.

Over the next few days, it seemed like a permanent storm cloud sat over the greater part of the country, causing a light drizzle to fall almost continuously. On the third day since the cloud had appeared, the day of the funeral, the sky opened up and it poured. Lily stood just inside of the back door of the Peters' home, staring out across the lawn at the rain. She hadn't spoken much since the hospital, and said even less nowadays. Though she hadn't really cried, either.

Alexa came into the kitchen, trying to change her earrings while she walked (which is rather difficult), saw Lily standing in the doorway, and said softly, "Hey there. You almost ready to go?"

The redhead turned slowly and stared for a moment, as if she hadn't quite caught the question, and finally nodded her head. She didn't _want_ to go, but she had to, and she wasn't exactly emotionally ready to put yet another family member in the ground, but physically, she looked ready. Clad in a black long sleeved shirt, a black skirt that went down to her ankles, and a pair of her mum's black stilettos (which she had been given not too long ago because she now had the same shoe size as her mother did), she was truly dressed for mourning. Her hair was pinned back away from her face with a few bobby pins. Alexa thought Lily looked rather sophisticated in her outfit, but also incredibly pale; black did not suit a (formerly) happy girl like her, and especially with her fair skin tone. It made her look a little washed out, and that's probably how she felt, too.

Alexa nodded, too, and then stood there a bit awkwardly, not really sure if she should leave Lily to her thoughts or go over to her in the hopes of cheering her up a bit. Finally she decided to leave her be, but when she turned to leave, Lily's small, tentative voice called her back.

"Do you think we could stop by the store before we go?" she asked, still looking at the lawn and the deck as they both got splattered with rain. "There's something I need to pick up."

"Sure, of course," Alexa replied, nodding. "We'll leave in a few minutes then. I'll go tell Ruby."

Out in the living room, Ruby was sitting on the couch, smoothing her black velvet skirt over her knees, all ready to go. "I wonder what she wants at the store," she said when Alexa told her what Lily said.

Shrugging, Alexa finally managed to get the clasp of her silver hoop earring closed. "I'm not sure, but it seems important to her. God, this is terrible. I can't stand just having to stand by and see my best friend in the whole world so…sad!"

Sighing, Ruby left the couch to hug her cousin reassuringly. "You're doing all that you can by just being here for her. At least she's not totally alone in this, you know?"

"I know, but it doesn't feel like I'm doing anything for her. I feel so helpless!" she cried, burying her face in her hands.

Lily came out of the kitchen, and Alexa instantly stood up. Wordlessly, the three girls headed for the front door.

They drove to the local grocery store in silence, and the only time they really spoke to each other was when Lily politely declined Ruby and Alexa's offer to go into the store with her.

When Lily came out of the store, she had two bouquets of flowers, one of red roses and the other of daisies. Once in the car, she took half of the daisies out of the second bouquet and put them in with the roses, and then she took out some roses and put them in with the rest of the daisies. Ruby and Alexa exchanged looks but didn't say anything to the other girl. They stopped again to pick up the boys (as they had no proper Muggle way of getting to the church). They all crammed into the backseat of Mrs. Peters' Dodge Neon, and Lily had to move up to the front of the car to sit between Ruby and Alexa, because with the three boys in the back, there was no room for her.

"Hey Lils, you _could_ always sit on James's lap you know," said Sirius, grinning wickedly, but his grin quickly disappeared as everyone (apart from Lily, who had apparently missed the comment) turned to glare at him; now was not exactly the best time to be joking around and/or messing with Lily.

The six of them had to huddle beneath two umbrellas, because only Alexa and Remus had brought one, the girls under Alexa's, and the boys under Remus's.

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After the church service, the six of them, along with most of the other people attending the funeral, went to the cemetery. There, more people said nice things about Mr. Evans and about how much he was going to be missed. Surprisingly, Lily didn't cry during the whole thing. She just stood stiffly and silently away from everyone else, staring at her father's coffin with lifeless eyes. After the graveside services, bunches of people surrounded Lily, making impossible for her friends to check on her. She nodded her head politely, thanking people for their condolences, but right as a plump little woman from her father's work stepped up, she walked away toward a blonde woman similarly dressed as she was.

"Veronica," she said gently, as not to startle the woman. "I tried calling you from the hospital but I couldn't get anyone to answer your mobile phone and I---"

_Crack!_ Lily stumbled backwards from the shock of the blow to the side of her face. She looked back at Veronica, holding the side of her face, looking confused and hurt. Veronica had gasped, and she now had a hand over her mouth, looking horrified with herself for doing such a thing.

"Oh, God, Lily, I'm so…" Veronica shook off her horror and shame and started to glare at the redheaded girl in front of her. "This is your fault! You, with your---" her voice lowered to a conspiratorial hiss---- "magic and what not, you should have been able to save him! You could have done something more for him, but you didn't! You failed him as a daughter!"

Remus had to hold back both James and Sirius from doing something stupid, since they were both now raging mad at the sight of Veronica slapping Lily. "Leave them be," he said. "This is a family thing, and I think it's best that all of us just stay out of it."

The girls nodded, trying to convince themselves that this confrontation between the blonde and redhead was none of their business. It wasn't working so well. James and Sirius calmed down a bit, though, which was good.

There was a long, shocked silence between Lily and her stepmother, until finally Lily looked up at her; her eyes were shining with unshed tears. "You're right," she managed to choke out, still holding her face. "You're absolutely right. I should have been able to stop this from ever happening, but I failed him, just like I failed my mum before him. I should have been able to stop them both from dying, but I couldn't. I'm a horrible daughter, and…I just wanted to say that I'm _sorry_, for being so unsupportive of your pregnancy. I hope you have a healthy baby, and all I ask is that you let your child know of his or her father." She swallowed and turned to leave, but then as an after thought, she added, "Veronica, if you have a boy, I think you should name him Harry; my dad would've liked that."

Veronica nodded slowly, weakly. Finally Lily turned to leave, but found yet another obstacle in her way, only this time it was Petunia and her brute of a fiancé. Petunia glared into Lily's face.

"She's right you know," the older Evans girl snapped, nose in the air with disdain. "With all of your freaky powers and what have you, you should have been able to do _something_ for our father, but then again it's just like you to think only of yourself when in a crisis, isn't it? It's the influence of that wretched school, I just know it. I told Mum and Dad that they shouldn't have let you gone, but they refused to listen, and look where it's gotten them: dead and buried!"

Lily turned her head away, sniffing. And then suddenly her temper began to flare into life. "This has absolutely nothing to do with Hogwarts and you know it, Petunia. You're just looking for someone to blame for things you don't understand."

"I don't need to look for anyone to blame when you're at fault, missy, now do I?" Petunia snapped back. She looked down her nose at her sister, shuddering with dislike. What a freak Lily had become! "You were at the house when this---"

"Yeah, well where the bloody hell were you when this happened?" Lily shrieked, causing her sister to back up a step and falter in her evil eye. "Where were you, Petty, huh? Are you too busy with your new life to even remember our parents? You can't pin this on me just because I was there! I'm always the one at the house, watching you and Dad get new lives and forget everything that happened! I'm _always_ there, sitting in an empty house in the middle of the bloody night, wondering if you and Dad are ever going to come home! And whenever you are at home, I'm still alone, it's still empty, because neither of you were ever there to begin with! Manage your own bloody life, marry that…. thing for all I care! Just leave me out of it!"

"See what I mean? All you can think about is you, you, you," Petunia said, daring to take another step closer to her sister, "even at our father's funeral. You acted like this when Mum passed away too. You don't even care that both our parents are gone, do you?"

Lily whipped out her wand, her hand trembling with rage, and Petunia backed up several feet. "Don't talk to me about feelings," she said, and even her voice was shaking with her anger. "You have no idea what hell I went through when Mum died, what I'm going through now."

Someone touched her shoulder gently, and she whirled around with her wand still out. It was Alexa, and she looked a little scared. "Lily, calm down for second and look at what you're doing," she said pleadingly, eyeing the wand in Lily's right hand anxiously.

Lily looked at her wand, too, and suddenly she burst into tears. "What's wrong with me?" she whispered, forcing her hand to put her wand away. She withdrew a hand that shook harder than ever. Alexa reached for her, but she jumped out of her friend's reach. "Don't—Don't touch me. I need to just----" She shook her head fiercely and ran away, away from everything, the funeral, her friends, what was left of her pathetic family, everything. She couldn't handle this right now, just couldn't deal.

Alexa turned back to the others, looking like she was about to cry, too. Sirius held out his arms, and she went to him, burying her face in his chest. After she'd calmed down a bit a few moments later, she asked, "Now what do we do? We don't even know where she's gone to."

James reached down and grabbed the abandoned flower bouquets, smelling one of the roses in the first bouquet. "I have a guess as to where she's going," he told the others.

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A/N: Wow…. long and very intense, yeah? Even _I_ almost started crying when I wrote this. Poor Lily.


	16. Strong and a Little Empty

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I don't own any of it.

_This wasn't how things were supposed to turn out_, Lily thought, furiously wiping at her eyes. She ran into the shoulder of a man, but didn't stop to apologize, and he said something rude to her, but she didn't care. _I was supposed to grieve, people were going to feel sorry for me for a bit, and then I'd get over it. Just like before._ She was not, however, supposed to loose her temper with her sister and threaten her with magic; that wasn't who she was. She had never, ever threatened a Muggle---especially her family---with magic before, and she was quite frankly very ashamed of herself for doing so at a time like this. Even though Petunia had said those awful, snide things, Lily knew that inside she was hurting, too. She was just too afraid to admit it. Petunia's way of mourning was to find someone to blame for what had happened, or bury herself with social events, like she had after their mum's death.

It was not the fact that Veronica and Petunia both blamed her for her father's death; they had just voiced what had been going on in her head since the accident. It was the fact that they both blamed her solely on the fact that she'd been in the house at the time. Of course she'd be at her own house, for heaven's sake! Where else was she supposed to be? But it wasn't just that. Mostly Lily had gotten so upset because they were right. Lily should have warned her father about the explosion before it'd happened; he'd been in kitchen, after all, so he might have been able to scramble out the backyard before, but she hadn't. She hadn't done _anything_ to save him.

She had no idea where her feet were taking her, just let them take her away from the graveyard. Then her feet stopped dead (pardon the pun) in the middle of the sidewalk, and Lily looked up to see where they'd taken her. It was her house, or rather what was left of it. The whole foyer had been completely destroyed, and the rooms surrounding that were scattered with debris. Her breath caught in her throat as she stepped toward the skeleton of her childhood home. She carefully stepped into the wrecked house, avoiding the larger pieces of debris. When she moved into the living room, her foot crunched down on something; bending down, she saw that she'd stepped on an old photograph. She traced her mother's face with a shaking finger, and then moved on to her dad. It was the picture of her parents at college, taken by one of their friends. They both looked so young, so happy, and so in love.

All she could think of was what either of them had done to deserve this, and who had done this to them. Carefully she set the photo down on the remains of the coffee table, and when her hand brushed the wood, an old memory popped into her mind. It was almost like a movie scene played out in front of her.

A redheaded toddler waddled into the living room from the kitchen, where a young couple held hands and watched her. She picked up speed, but suddenly got tangled up in her own feet, and went toppling over into the coffee table headfirst. Her mother let out a startled gasp and went running toward the toddler, who was now screaming quite loudly, her face bright red, and a wound near her temple bleeding. Her father also came rushing into the room to where the woman cuddled the child to her chest.

"Oh, Lily," cooed her mother, rocking her back and forth in her lap to get her to stop crying. "You silly thing. You can't run before you learn to walk, darling! What a scare you gave us…"

The current Lily fingered the scar near her temple gently, reminiscing. She remembered that her mother had told her that she'd gotten stitches that day, but she'd stopped trying to run for a while after that incident. Sniffing, the redhead walked to the kitchen doorway, running her hands along the wood there, too. Another scene played out in front of her.

A woman, a redheaded girl around the age of five, and another girl, this one a brunette the age of seven, all stood around the kitchen table in front of a bowl of cookie dough. The five-year-old stuck her finger in the bowl, but didn't manage to grab any of the dough because her mother gently slapped her hand away. 

"I told you we shouldn't have let Lily help, Mum," said the brunette girl, glaring at the redhead. "All she does is cause trouble."

"_Nonsense," said Mrs. Evans, smiling fondly down at the redhead. "Lily's going to do great things when she gets older, won't you, darling?"_

_Yeah, great things,_ Lily thought bitterly. Those great things entitled getting both her parents killed. Great things, indeed. If only her mother knew what she'd turned into.

"I thought I'd find you here." She jumped and whipped around to the back door, where James Potter stood. Somehow she wasn't very surprised to see him here. She turned away, and he came inside. That didn't surprise her, either.

When James didn't say anything for a moment, she finally gave in and asked, "What are you doing here, James?" It felt like she was asking him that question a lot lately.

He shrugged, wondering if he should answer with his traditional response of, "I wanted to see if you were okay," or something else, something that might cheer her up a bit. Finally he said, "I missed your delightful company."

She rolled her eyes, but he saw a small smile tugging at her lips. But it was gone in a few seconds. "Why is it that you always manage to find me when I'm miserable?" she asked him, sighing. Her eyes scanned the room and fell on the puddle of her father's blood. He followed her gaze to the blood and winced slightly.

"Oh, you know," he said, waving a hand in the air. "Misery loves company and all that, in which case you're misery, and I'm company."

"Are you trying to tell me that I love you?"

"I dunno," he said seriously. "You tell me."

Her shoulders fell. "James, don't do this right now."

He wanted to respond with, "Hey, you're the one who brought this up," but decided against it. "I'm sorry. I'm just trying to take your mind off what's going on." She sniffed a little, but tried to cover it up with a fake cough. "Hey, you okay?"

Standing a little bit straighter, she replied sarcastically, "Yeah, James, I'm fine. You know, burying my dad, being slapped by my step mum and threatening my sister with magic, that just makes my day a little bit brighter."

"Hey Lils?"

"What?" she snapped.

He took a small step forward. "Even if I do happen to get on your nerves a lot, me and others can be a family to you, too. We're all here for you, if you ever need a shoulder or five to cry on."

There was a long moment of silence, and then, slowly, she turned around to face him. "Thank you," she whispered, finding it suddenly very hard to talk over the large lump that had formed in her throat. "You have no idea what that means to me." She sniffed again, trying hard not to cry, but this time she didn't bother trying to cover it up. "And I'm sorry, James. I've been a bloody mess these past few days, and I know I haven't been the greatest person to be around, but you, all of you guys, really, have been so good to me, even though I've been acting so distant lately."

"Lily, I think you have the right to be a mess," James said, reaching out to brush a strand of her hair out of her face. "I mean, bloody hell, if my parents both died, I'd…I dunno, but I wouldn't be handling it as well as you have been."

"Yeah, that's me, staying calm and distant in the worst of situations." She swallowed again. "I always have been the 'strong one,' as my dad always says---said." It hurt to have to use the past participle when referring to her father.

He looked worried for a spilt second, but then it disappeared. "You don't always have to be the strong one. Even you need to express your emotions sometimes. Don't worry about crying in front of me, either, if that's why you won't cry; I promise not to tell anyone that the strong, stubborn, fiery-tempered Lily Evans actually cried. Besides, it's not good to hold in emotions like you're doing."

"I'm not 'holding in emotions,'" she said, but her voice cracked. "I know it's stupid to keep emotions bottled up, thank you very much."

"Oh, come on, Lily, you're dad just died and the rest of your so called 'family' just blamed you for his death! Don't you feel a little bit upset?"

"I don't want to cry! I've always been the one who never cried! I was always there when someone wanted to cry on _my_ shoulder. I'm not supposed to cry, I'm supposed to listen and sympathize, not the other way around. I'm supposed to be strong, damn it!"

"You _are_ strong," James told her, searching her eyes for something he knew was just beneath the surface. "You're the strongest person I know, Lily, and that's saying something. But even strong people cry now and then, honest."

"If I'm so strong why do I feel like this, huh?" she asked wildly. "Why, James, why? Why do I feel so…angry, and sad, and empty all at the same time? I don't understand why all of this is happening to me. Everyone keeps telling me they're sorry for my loss, that my dad was a great man, but no one can tell me why this happened to him! If he was so great, why did he die?" A tear fell down her cheek, followed by another, and another. "I can't understand why anyone wanted to take him from me. And no one can tell me _why._ He didn't deserve to die, James! He had his whole life in front of him!"

"Oh, Lily," he said, and even his voice cracked. "It's natural to feel like that." He wanted to say more, but he didn't know what else to say that would make her feel better.

"It doesn't feel natural," she said, wiping at her eyes, but the tears kept falling anyway. "I feel rotten, because I'm not just a little mad…I feel like I hate them both, for leaving me here to take care of everything. I'm seventeen! I'm not supposed to be worrying about things like this, I'm supposed to be freaking out about getting all of my homework done. I hate them, James, and I feel bad about that."

"It's okay to be angry with your parents. No one should have to worry about this," he said strongly, swallowing against his own tears. He felt like he hated her parents, too, for leaving her like this, torn and broken and scared of what was going to happen next. "They shouldn't have left you. You have the right to hate them, Lily. Hate away."

"I feel like everything's falling apart, and all I can do is watch while everyone I love just disappears. I feel helpless, weak, like I can't do anything to help anyone. I hate them so much right now, it's scaring me." She looked up at the ceiling, which was blurry through her tears. "You hear that, Mum and Dad? I _hate_ you both! You're supposed to be here for me, but you're not! It's not fair!" She choked out a sob, and then screamed at the top of her lungs into the empty house, "I HATE YOU!"

Her knees gave out, and she fell to the floor, sobbing into her hands. He knelt down next to her, pulled her into his arms, and let her cry into him. Secretly he cried, too.

A/N: **Sobs**. I actually did start crying while I wrote this. It's just so sad. I'd really like it if you'd please review, as I've been putting in a lot of effort into these last few chapters, and yet no one's been really reviewing for them. I've been writing five pages lately, for crying out loud (last chapter I wrote 1979 words, and this chapter I wrote even more with 2044 words)! So please review, please. Also, I'd like to thank MIDNIGHT-PIXIE, who has been reviewing continuously for this story. You're fantabulous! Thanks so much!


	17. Mourning

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters (except for Alexa and her family, which includes Ruby), but the ideas are mine.

Neither of them knew how long they say in the house, but eventually Lily's crying slowed, and then completely stopped after a while. Her breathing slowed, too, until at one point James thought she was sleeping, but she wasn't. Finally, after what seemed like an eon of silence, Lily said, "You must think that I'm a horrible, selfish person for hating my parents just because they died."

James shook his head and said strongly, "Of course I don't think that about you, Lily. I already told you that you had the right to hate your parents for leaving you all alone."

Sighing, she pushed herself off the floor and brushed the stray bits of glass and wood splinters from her skirt. A larger piece of glass had embedded itself into her leg; blood seeped through the wound, pooling around the glass. At first all she did was look at the gash, unaware of the pain in her leg. Then she came to her senses and removed the bloody shard of glass from the wound with a soft hiss of air being pushed through her front teeth, the sensation of pain finally making itself known.

"I suppose we should get back to….to the others," she said at last, looking down at him from his place on the floor. He hadn't gotten up yet.

"You don't have to go back there, you know," he replied, standing up and brushing himself off, too. "I think the others would understand if you didn't go back."

"No, I _want_ to go back. There's something I need to do," she said, talking to herself as much as him. Suddenly something occurred to her. "Oh no! My flowers! I must have left them---" She turned to look at him, panic in her eyes.

Wordlessly, James pointed to the counter behind her; two bouquets of roses and daisies lay there where he'd set them when he'd entered the house. She looked so relieved when she saw them, he thought that she might start crying again, but she didn't. Instead, she went over to the counter and picked up the flowers with hands that shook.

They walked back to the cemetery in silence. When they got there, Alexa and Ruby flocked over to them and began hovering worriedly over Lily.

"Oh, Lily, I was so worried about you!" Alexa exclaimed, obviously upset that the redhead had run off like she had.

"We had no idea where you'd run off too, either," Ruby added. "We weren't sure if James would find you, and if he did we thought that he might make it worse, since he does kind of have the tendency to do that kind of thing, you know. We thought he'd screw things up with you for sure---"

The redhead looked around the clucking girls and met James's eyes, looking for someone to help her get away from the madness. He remembered her saying something about having something to do, and it had seemed important to her. He cleared his throat, but the girls ignored him entirely and continued to fuss about the redhead.

"Alexa, Ruby," he said finally, his voice rough. The cousins turned to him, and all he did was shake his head and the girls backed away from Lily. James watched as she walked over to her father's grave, the two bouquets of flowers still in her arms. The rest of the teens followed her at a distance, and then stopped under a tree as she knelt in the wet grass between two tombstones. She set a bouquet against each slab of granite, and curiosity got the better of James; he walked over to where she sat and looked down at the tombstones.

As he'd been expecting, one of them was for her father, but the other one had been divided in half by a line carved in the stone. The top half was inscribed for an Adrienne Rose Evans, "Best friend, great mother, and loving wife," and the second half was for one Harry Matthew Evans, who had "the ability to come into the world with a family who already loved him."

Suddenly rain began to fall from the skies. "I always used to think that the rain meant that my mum was crying," she whispered a bit sheepishly, looking up at him. When she noticed that he as looking at the second tombstone, she said, a bit louder, "They cremated the baby's body and buried his remains with my mum. My dad thought Mum would have wanted it that way."

James swallowed past the lump in his throat. "I know that saying sorry won't change the past, and also that you're probably really tired of hearing it, but I am truly sorry for your losses. I might not have really known either of your parents, but I'm sure they're both really proud of everything you've become, of everything you will become."

"Thanks for saying that, and for everything else you've done for me these past few months. It means a lot."

He smiled shyly. "Now what was that you were saying about the rain?"

"I used to think that when it rained, my mum was crying for something," she replied, raising her face to the sky. Her face was splashed with the icy drops falling from the sky. "I think now my dad's crying, too. They're mourning their loss."

"The loss of what?" he asked quietly, and what she answered with made him realize for the first time just how much Lily had been forced to grow up in the past few months.

She met his eyes for a brief moment before standing up. "Their daughter." Turning around without another word, she began walking back to where the car was parked.

The others joined her, James hesitant to follow. He glanced one more time at the gravestones that marked the loss of the redhead's family (apart from Petunia, who didn't really count as her family, in his opinion). Slowly he followed the others back to the car.

Grinning, he caught up to Lily after a moment. "Go out with me, Evans?" he asked merrily, and Alexa turned to him, a horrified look on her face.

Smiling back at him, Lily punched his arm playfully and said, "Not in a million years, Potter."

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Later that night, Lily snuck out of the Peters' house, and once she was safely out of hearing range of the house, she Apparated with a loud _crack_ like a gunshot. Wrapped in a black cloak, it was relatively easy to walk along the streets of Knockturn Alley unnoticed. She received a few looks from a group of shady-looking witches huddled together against the wall of an equally shady-looking shop, seeking shelter from the rain. Ignoring the witches, she stepped inside the shop without glancing at the name.

Without removing the hood of her cloak even though she was away from the pelting raindrops, she strode over to the counter, where a shaggy old wizard stood dozing. She rang the bell on the counter, and the wizard jumped, pulling out his wand defensively. Inside her cloak, Lily's hand wrapped tighter around her own wand.

"What can I do for you, little missy?" the wizard asked once he realized that she posed no threat at the moment.

"I want a Time turner, and I heard that you carry them."


	18. TimeHealsAllWounds

Friendship Has Its Limits

Disclaimer: I don't own it. Period.

Fredrick's eyes instantly narrowed as he stared at the hooded figure in front of him. "How did you know that I carry Time Turners?" he asked suspiciously.

The young woman waved a dismissive hand and said airily, "I have my sources, thank you. Now, I already know for certain that you have them, considering your words jut now, but I'd rather like to know the price that you're selling them for."

Greed shone quite clearly in Fredrick's beady black eyes. "Well, they aren't going cheap, that I can assure you of," he told her haughtily. "They weren't easy to obtain, I'll have you know."

"I would assume not," she replied indifferently. "I'm sure breaking into the Ministry and stealing them wasn't easy."

"Now wait just a moment," Fredrick said, now even more suspicious than ever of this hooded woman. "I never told you I got them from the Ministry—"

"It's rather obvious that that's where you got them from, isn't it?" she interrupted, her patience wearing thin. "No other place is qualified to carry them, so that tells me that you must have stolen them from the Ministry."

"Not me, exactly," Fredrick insisted. "I just do the selling, you see, it's really a bloke called Fletcher who does the stealing---"

"The price of the Time Turner, if you please," she interrupted again, obviously not caring who did the selling and who did the stealing.

"It's a hefty price, I'm sure you understand why, missy. I'm not sure such a pretty, young---"

Her hand emerged from the black cloak she wore; Fredrick was momentarily transfixed by the shining amount of gold pieces in her palm. "I should think that this would more than cover it."

Fredrick pocketed the gold almost faster than the girl's eyes could follow. Then he went into the back room, rummaged through a cardboard box for a moment before his hand finally wrapped around the object he was looking for, and reappeared at the counter. He set the Time Turner on the glass of the counter and carefully slid it across to her.

As she picked it up with shaking hands, he proffered her a long, gold chain. "I'll throw this in the bargain for free, if you want it."

Looking into his eyes for the first time, she slightly inclined her head in a silent thank you as she accepted the chain. Then she broke the eye contact, turned on her heel, and left the shop at a brisk pace.

Those spectacular green eyes would haunt Fredrick for years to come.

u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n u n

By the time Lily arrived at the Peters' home, it was light outside, and she knew that someone was bound to be awake. Because of that shopkeeper's babbling and ramblings on about money and what not, her task had taken longer than she had expected; still, she'd been prepared to answer questions if anyone had noticed her gone in the night. She removed her cloak, shrunk it, and carefully put it into the pocket of her jean shorts. Taking a moment to rake her fingers through her tangled hair, she then pushed through the back door into the kitchen. As she had expected, someone was awake; Mrs. Peters was standing at the counter near the kitchen sink, brewing tea. She glanced up as Lily entered the kitchen.

"Oh, hello dear," Mrs. Peters said pleasantly, obviously surprised that someone was awake already. "I hadn't expected anyone to wake for another hour. We're mostly late sleepers in this family, except for me, that is."

Lily nodded, remembering the countless times she'd had to wake Alexa for breakfast at Hogwarts, fearing that her friend would miss it.

"Why don't you take a seat at the table there," said Mrs. Peters, motioning to the large dining table in the middle of the kitchen. "Would you care for a cup of tea then?"

"Yes, please," the redhead responded as she pulled up a chair and sat down. So far, all was going well; she hadn't been asked where she'd gone off to this early in the morning, which meant that she didn't have to lie. "Thank you."

"I know you probably don't want to hear this right now," said Mrs. Peters as she sat down beside Lily, setting a mug of tea in front of her, "but I just wanted to say how sorry I am about your father. I might not have known him, but I do know that he must have been a wonderful man to have raised a young woman such as yourself. I also wanted to say that I admire the amount of strength you have to handle a situation like this. It's a really terrible thing to have happened, and I just can't believe that you've been taking this so well, that you haven't tried to do anything rash."

Adverting Mrs. Peters' eyes, Lily fingered the thin gold chain around her neck. "Thank you for saying those things about my dad. He was a wonderful man."

Mrs. Peters smiled and covered Lily's hand with her own, but just as she opened her mouth to say something, there was a knock at the back door. "Oh, blast. Who would be calling at such an hour of the morning?" she muttered as she got up to answer the door. Lily was glad that Mrs. Peters had stopped talking about how well she was handling this, especially with the plan that the redhead had formed. "Oh, Albus, please come in and have some tea."

Lily's head snapped up to see Albus Dumbledore standing in the doorway, and her guilt level rose even higher. What would he say if he knew what she was planning?

"No, that's quite alright," Dumbledore said, stepping into the kitchen. "I just need to have a few words with Miss Evans."

Lily's heart sank and she swallowed hard before squeaking. "Me?"

"Yes, Miss Evans, you," Dumbledore said, smiling. Smiling was a good sign, the redhead thought hopefully. Smiling meant that he couldn't possibly know of her plan. He sat down at the table across from the redhead. "Due to the circumstances, you'll need to go back to your old home and retrieve the objects that you won't be coming back for, anything you'd like to keep. Naturally, the Muggle authorities will want to deal with the house as soon as possible, so perhaps later today you'd stop by and gather your possessions."

"Go…back? To my house?" Then it hit her. "Oh, right. They'll want to bulldoze the house to make room for a new one since no one will live there anymore. So I need to get my stuff."

"Right you are, Miss Evans. Now I suggest that you take along an escort, just for safety measures, of course."

Wait a moment. "Safety measures?" she repeated. "What do you mean? Professor, do you know something that I don't?"

But Dumbledore was already standing up and heading for the door again. He paused at the doorway, glancing back at her for a moment before stepping out into the yard, where he Disapparated with a loud _crack_, leaving her to contemplate his words. But she didn't have to worry much about it; after all, this would be the perfect opportunity to initiate her plan.

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A few hours later, after breakfast, Alexa and Lily went back to the latter's house to get her possessions. They were pretty much silent all the way over there, as Alexa thought Lily might want some quiet to think things over. Truthfully, the redhead used the silence to put the finishing touches on her plan, since she hadn't expected the complication of Alexa to arise. But by the time they reached the house, Lily had it all figured out.

"Alexa, I think I want to go inside by myself, if that's okay," she said when Alexa went to open the front door. "It's nothing personal or anything, I just kind of want to be alone."

"Oh, okay. Of course you can go inside by yourself," the other girl said understandingly. "After all, it's not like you're a little girl anymore. I'm sure you're quite capable of going inside a house by yourself. I'll see you in a little bit then?"

Lily nodded somewhat impatiently and stepped into the house, closing the door behind her. Once she was sure she was alone, Lily reached into her shirt and removed the Time Turner. Hesitating for only a moment, she swallowed and glanced out the front window, where she saw Alexa sitting in the grass, loyally waiting for her friend's return.

_I'm sorry, Alexa_, Lily thought as she began to set the Time Turner, _but I have to make things right again._

Author's Note: So, now for answered comments!

**Hermione Elizabeth Granger: **I know that the Ministry are the only ones with Time Turners. I'd thought that out before I wrote the last chapter, and I think this chapter explains it a little further. Obviously the shops in Knockturn Alley are not exactly…pleasant or necessarily legal shops, so it is quite possible that they could have stolen a few Time Turners. Also, thanks for the idea of using a Time Turner. :D Also, torture Snape how, exactly? Any ideas?

**MIDNIGHT-PIXIE:** Do you now know what Lily wants with a Time Turner?

**Umino Ayame:** Look out doctors, Petunia, and Veronica! Lol, just kidding. But if I were them, I'd be very scared of you coming to yell at me.

**Weird Not Boring:** Thanks for both the wows, and also the encouraging words. Glad you like it so far.

**Ktoddhim:** Thanks a ton! I'm glad you think I'm doing a good job with my writing. Writing's my passion, and so as you can imagine, it would suck if it was my passion and I sucked at it, eh? It's good to know that I don't suck at it, though.


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